Down A Different Path
by steamfan
Summary: What if Diana had chosen a different Visitor to mate with Robin Maxwell?  Perhaps someone close to her, rather than close to Robin?  This story goes AU from the time Robin is captured and taken to the mother ship.  I do not own anything of V.
1. Chapter 1

Title: Down A Different Path

Fandom: V

Rating: R

Summary: What if Diana had chosen a different Visitor to mate with Robin Maxwell? Perhaps someone a little closer to her? This story goes AU from the time Robin is captured and taken to the LA Mother ship.

Author: Dragonfan

Lieutenant Martin, personal aide to the Science Officer of the Visitor Fleet, walked into Diana's personal lab. "You wanted to see me Diana?" he asked calmly. Science Officer Diana, who wore the disguise of a dark haired Human woman, was seated at the desk on the far side of her lab. Martin knew well before he felt the press of the laser pistol to his head that Diana's current lover was there. He just hadn't expected to be held at gun point. 'Had Diana finally figured out who helped Donovan escape?' he wondered.

Mike Donovan, a Human camera man and investigative reporter had been caught earlier trying to sneak aboard the Mother ship. Both he and his sound man had been captured. But while his sound man had fallen to Diana's sick scientific curiosity and had lost his life, Martin had helped Donovan to escape.

"Ah Martin, so glad you could join us," Diana smiled. Martin knew that she wouldn't be smiling if she knew just what he'd been up to in opposing the Leader's plans. 'She must be up to something else.' He knew that he wouldn't like it, if only because of the pistol barrel resting against his head. But there was also the fact that he knew Diana.

Diana was one sick bitch as the Humans liked to say. He'd seen more than a few things over the last two years that only the discipline he'd learned from his martial arts teacher had kept him from losing the contents of his stomach over. But the look on her face would have had him sweating if his reptilian physiology had been capable of it. Fortunately Martin had long before learned how to keep outwardly perfectly composed around her, no matter what was happening.

"I know how difficult your orders from the Leader have been for you personally," Diana continued, oblivious to Martin's discomfort.

With that single sentence Martin realized what was going on. Diana wanted revenge for Martin's refusal to come to her bed. He would far rather give up sex than sleep with her. She was pissed that she couldn't have him, even though he was her personal aid. She believed that he should have been assisting her in that area as well. It didn't matter to her if he wanted to be her lover or not. To Diana, only her needs and appetites were important.

Martin knew from the way Diana was looking at him that she'd found a way around the Leader's edict that he not breed, even by accident without special permission from the Leader's breeding council. The Leader had also imposed strict laws regarding breeding for ordinary people as well. Publicly it was a measure to reduce their over population problems. In reality he was actually trying to breed better warriors and had been selecting certain people as special breeders for years. More warriors and fewer civilians made for a much easier population for the Leader to control.

Diana didn't know why Martin was on the list for special breeders. Martin had eliminated that information from his file as soon as he had found out that he was going to be assigned to the fleet. He didn't want anyone, especially someone as crazy as Diana to find out that he was one of the extremely rare twins to hatch alive.

But at the moment, that was neither here nor there. He had to deal with whatever new scheme Diana had cooked up this time. He watched as she slunk out of her chair and over to him. "Which is why I've done my best to figure out a way for you to, shall we say, relieve the stress he has placed you under. I don't wish to go against his orders of course," she smiled and Martin could see the vindictive pleasure both in her expression and body language. "But I just couldn't stand the thought of you suffering in silence any longer. Follow me."

Knowing that he wasn't about to get out of whatever Diana had planned for him, Martin silently followed. It would do no good to protest. When Diana got into one of these moods it was best to go along with her and take whatever punishment she dished out. At least he wasn't being ordered into her bed anymore. Diana led him down to one of the nicer security cells.

When he saw the dark haired young human girl though, his stomach sank. Diana really wasn't going to do what he thought she was, was she? Martin wasn't a prude, although he had projected that image at Diana so as not to be more desirable to her. He had been breed many times by the Leader, in hopes that more twins would hatch. Both he and his brother had become used to performing when ordered, although neither liked it.

But this was a Human girl. She couldn't be more than sixteen at most, if Martin's guess was accurate. He knew that Diana had taken Humans to her bed, most of them without their consent. But he had never been attracted to the way Humans looked. He had gotten used to the body suits that they wore to make them appear Human and had come to find Humans attractive in a distant, aesthetic sort of way, the way you would find any graceful creature. But the thought of mating with one had never crossed his mind in even in his wildest dreams.

He took a second look as they stepped into the cell and the girl backed away from them. 'Shit!' Martin thought with disgust. 'She can't be old enough to do this. And even if Diana did mate me with her there isn't a chance of any offspring.' The thought trailed away as he realized just what was going on. Diana would have her revenge in the nastiest way possible.

There was no way for a child to occur naturally between a Visitor and a Human. By mating him to a Human female, Diana was observing the Leader's orders that no child be conceived or at least that was what she would say if asked. Diana thought that he was a prude though. She probably thought that he'd refuse, thus giving her a reason to have him shot. And even if he didn't, she'd have the satisfaction of watching him have sex with a Human, something she thought he would abhor. She would be very pleased to see him humiliated.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Robin Maxwell knew that she shouldn't have left the rebel's hideout but she had just wanted to feel the air on her face without restrictions for a minute. She hadn't meant to be gone long or to get into any trouble. She just wasn't used to living like a fugitive and needed to feel free for a short time. 'Big mistake,' she growled at herself.

She had been caught like the amateur she was. But instead of being brought to a police station like she had expected for breaking curfew, she had been taken to the Visitor's LA mother ship. Once there she, along with the other women, had been searched, scanned and then she was taken to this cell and left alone.

By the time the door had finally opened she had nearly worked herself into a panic. It didn't help that the one Visitor that she knew, Brian, walked in holding a laser pistol to another's head. Where Brian was tall, dark and handsome in a teenaged boy fantasy kind of way, the Visitor he was holding at pistol point was shorter, stockier, blond and much older. He wasn't as handsome in Robin's opinion, but he wasn't a dog.

Robin wasn't happy that Diana walked in behind them with a smile on her face either. Robin didn't know what was going on but her slim hope at Brian's arrival was shattered by the gleeful looks on Brian's and Diana's faces. Robin might have been only a teenaged girl, a spoiled California princess at that, but she was more than familiar with those sorts of looks. She had seen the exact same look on the faces of the popular girls at school when they were about to publicly humiliate someone. It was just her luck that she seemed to be part of the object lesson. There would be no help to be found from either of them.

When Diana began her little speech, Robin didn't get it at first. But by the time the Visitor called Martin began stripping off his uniform the realization that she could either have sex with the alien or be eaten (EATEN!?!?!) had fully penetrated her mind. Although she might be a sixteen year old girl in the middle of the full teen angst and rebellion stage of life, Robin Maxwell was no fool. She stripped as well. She also began to hate Brian, her former crush with a passion.

Martin couldn't just have sex with the girl without saying anything. Not only would that be rude light years beyond what was even remotely acceptable, he had to let her know that he didn't want to hurt her. He also didn't dare let Diana know that he was at all concerned about the girl or she would use that against him. He'd just have to do what he could for now and try to make it up to the girl later. "I don't want to hurt you but I have my orders," he said to her calmly.

"Thanks," Robin said. She didn't bother to mention his 'orders' because, really?, the pistol that Brian had jammed into his head said it all. If he didn't do what he was supposed to, Brian would shoot him. And Robin was convinced that Brian would love to do just that.

Martin didn't know much about Human mating customs, at least as far as the mechanics of sex were concerned. He had only skimmed over that part of the information that he had been given, being far more concerned with learning the language and public behaviors of Humans. But he did know that most intimate contact among Humans began with kissing. So, with the laser pistol still jammed into his head, that's where he started.

Robin placed her arms around his neck and stood up on her toes to try and reach. Quickly understanding the problem that their differences in height created, Martin gently lifted her off the ground. Robin quickly wrapped her legs around his waist to get a better grip. Much to his surprise the experience was much more pleasant than he had expected, and her position made sex with her rather easy.

To their later surprise, they both quickly forgot both Diana and Brian were even in the room with them. In fact it wasn't until Diana grabbed Martin's right arm and peeled a strip of the scales off his arm that she got his attention. Martin jerked his head away from Robin and hissed in pain. Robin stared in shock as the same thing happened to her right arm. Through the pain she could barely make out that Diana was grafting Martin's green, scaly skin onto her arm in place of the strip of Robin's skin that she had peeled off and had done the same with her skin to Martin's arm. Robin was in too much pain to freak out but she distinctly heard Diana say, "I'm sure you'll be very happy together," before she and Brian left laughing.

Robin couldn't move, pinned to the wall as she was by Martin's weight. He eased her down and left her on the floor, clutching her arm while he grabbed his uniform. He quickly threw it on and then grabbed Robin's clothes. He tried to gently help her put them on but was hampered by the fact that he really didn't know how they went on as well as his injured arm. Robin helped as best as she could and between the two of them, they managed to get her mostly dressed. Then he took her to his personal quarters.

Martin's personal quarters were small, although large for a junior officer. Entering the quarters Robin could see that there was a built in bunk on the right hand side and a door on the left led to the bath. The bath wasn't large but held a dust shower, a small sink and an elimination booth. The sleeping chamber had a wall of built in cabinets, animal cages and a desk opposite the bunk. The far wall had a port hole.

Martin set her down on his bunk and then set a small malfunction into effect in the surveillance monitors. He and his brother had often been spied upon as children. By the time they had discovered it they had also figured out a way around it and that they couldn't do it very often without being discovered. But if ever there was a time he needed privacy it was now. The moment the security cameras were down he started cursing. "Zon take her on a trip through all twelve hells!"

Robin watched as Martin pulled out what seemed to be some kind of first aid kit, at least that's what she hoped it was, and continued to curse at Diana, Brian and it seemed the universe in general. He knelt down next to the bunk. "I don't know if this will work on you but it's all I've got," he explained as he gently pulled her hand away from the skin graft. He gently worked some type of paste/lotion all over the graft and into the skin around it while muttering to himself in his native language.

Robin was fairly sure that he was swearing again. It occurred to her that she should have been scared out of her wits but just as the pain in her arm faded and she was about to freak out, Martin spoke in English. "And to top it all off the psychotic bitch didn't let me finish!" In that moment Martin went from a six foot tall, mouse eating (she could see a group of them in the cages along the wall) reptile alien to simply a guy.

Robin burst out laughing. She couldn't help it. It was a choice between either laughing or crying and his remark was so typically male that laughter won out. He'd had the skin on his arm ripped off without benefit of painkillers, had her skin grafted onto his arm and he was complaining about not getting off. The offended look on his face didn't help and she continued giggling while he gently wrapped gauze around her arm.

"I'm sorry," she finally managed to get out. "But that was such a guy thing to say! I mean, you could have been any of the guys at school for a minute there. By the way, I'm Robin Maxwell."

Martin leaned back and took some of the medication for his own arm. "Martin and I think I can understand that, it's just that thanks to Diana I've been celibate for two years now because I'd rather give up sex than sleep with her. I guess she finally figured that out. She wouldn't have been vicious enough to marry us like this if she hadn't."

That stopped Robin's laughter cold, "Marry?"

"The closest translation into your language would be 'Battle Bride'," Martin said as he tried to medicate himself. Robin took a bit of the goop and began to smear it onto Martin's arm the same way he had hers. "Thanks," he said and sagged against the wall that made up the headboard for his bunk. "It's one of our oldest and most honored traditions and of course Diana has perverted it. But you do meet all of the requirements, at least as far as I'm concerned."

"What are those?" Robin asked.

"You are, or rather were a virgin female, your father is a member of those who have taken up arms against our Leader, and he's an important figure in your resistance," Martin paused to hand Robin the gauze. "Of course I don't happen to agree with our Leader in his plans for this planet but that's beside the point right now. Diana thinks that I do and her giving you to me as a Battle Bride as a reward is what is required on her part. The fact that she thinks of you as food is the real perversion, that and the fact that she didn't bother with any ceremony or pain killers. The only thing she needed to do to make this legal was the skin grafts."

"Oh crap," Robin muttered, overwhelmed by the idea of suddenly being married and to an alien at that.

"My people don't have divorce but I'm sure that we can get someone from whoever does divorces for your people to do whatever it is they do to end a marriage. Your people do require your consent, correct? That should give them a reason to end the marriage." Martin tried to reassure her that he be willing to end their marriage.

"Yeah, but it looks like shotgun weddings are normal for yours." Robin was faced with a hard decision. There were certain things that she had sworn to herself that she would never do and getting a divorce, unless her life was in danger from the man she married, was one of them. Martin hadn't hurt her. In fact he had been the only one to offer her any medical attention at all. From what she had seen he was a genuinely nice guy. She sighed, "I don't believe in divorce except under special circumstances and you don't qualify. You haven't tried to kill me, you've done your best to try and keep me from getting hurt. I can understand why you might want one though."

Martin watched as Robin finished wrapping his arm. The two inch band of her skin on his arm was covered now but what it represented was burned into his mind. "Battle Brides are an important part of our history and culture. Wars have ended because of them, alliances have shifted, heroes have been hatched to them, it is one of the most honorable positions in my culture," Martin said softly. "But Diana and the Leader have done away with honor and it is more than I can stand. He has done things that are dishonorable in the name of keeping our people alive but the real reason is so that he can gain more power. He has taken the position of Battle Bride and defiled it. He takes women who are not qualified and uses them to breed shock troops, turning them back on their mother's people."

Martin looked into Robin's eyes. "I cannot be a part of that. My mother was a Battle Bride. My father caught her himself in a raid. Their marriage ended a generations long conflict between their Houses. My father taught my brother and I that Battle Brides are to be honored above all else. They are bringers of peace. I know very little about your customs and I do not wish to," Martin shrugged helplessly. He wasn't even sure what could happen but there were a vast unlimited number of things that could go wrong. "How can I honor you?"

Robin sat holding Martin's uncovered hand. There was no denying his reptilian nature. She was holding onto the proof. Where a Human hand would have nails, he had claws, short and black. His hand was covered in soft green scales. But he spoke of honor and history, things that her parents used to debate over dinner. And he wanted to honor her. He had asked her how to do that rather than just assuming that she'd fall into his customs. Was staying married to him all that bad?

Sex with him sure hadn't been, at least before their audience had butted in with the whole rip their skin off bit. "I guess we stay married then. It wasn't that long ago that marriages weren't up to the girl or even the guy sometimes, just over a century or so. I don't know what we're going to do." Robin echoed Martin as she too trailed off helplessly. She was only sixteen. Her life wasn't supposed to go like this!

"Take it one day at a time I guess," Martin said. "I can give us a few more hours of privacy but then the cameras will turn back on. When that happens Diana will be watching. I have to be her loyal lieutenant where she can see," he warned.

Robin huffed, "I'd rather she have to figure out if we did anything or not than give her another show."

Martin grinned, "She thinks I'm a prude and that the only way I'd have sex with you is with a pistol to my head."

"Is it true?" Robin asked, flirting a little. She hoped that it wasn't. Sex with him had been good. She'd come once and he hadn't been close to finishing.

"No, I just didn't want her to get ideas," he admitted.

"Well then, let's see how many times we can fix your frustration problem," Robin said and leaned in to kiss him.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Martin couldn't help but feel satisfied, a little lost in his own world, as he went about his duties the next day. While his night with Robin hadn't been his longest performance, (three times last night and once this morning) he'd had a surprisingly good time and Robin hadn't any complaints either. It wasn't until Donovan grabbed him that he woke up from his bemusement.

It was time to let Donovan, and through him the people of Earth, know what the Leader had planned for them. He took Donovan to one of the holds where Humans were being stored for cannon fodder and for food. Then he took the Human down to where his partner Tony's remains were. Martin knew that they hadn't been cleaned up yet. That was where they met another captive Human; one who had been badly beaten. His name was Sancho. Martin knew that Diana had a raid planned in a matter of minutes. He would have a chance to get Donovan, Sancho and Robin off of the Mother ship while that was happening.

Too bad it didn't quite work out that way. He managed to get Robin to the small fighter while Donovan got Sancho but when they arrived, Donovan didn't want Martin to fly the fighter. He wanted Martin to stay on the Mother ship and help out the rebels from there. Martin didn't want to do it. He was scared of what Diana would do to him, but more importantly he was worried about Robin. How would her people react to their marriage? Who would defend her? She had to be his first priority. He looked over at her to see her nod in agreement with Donovan. She wanted him to stay. He was more valuable here leading the Fifth Column, or perhaps she hadn't been so pleased with his performance after all. He really needed to look up Human sex practices when he got the chance.

Relenting, Martin told him how to fly the fighter. Then Robin did something that would shock him when he woke up later. "Martin, you'll need a story," she said. And then she swung the laser pistol she'd slipped out of his holster. Donovan looked over at her in shock as Martin folded, knocked out. "Well, that's what they do on TV! Get him out of here and take off!" she said.

Donovan knew she was right, although TV rarely got the details correct. With a whispered apology, he tossed Martin out the hatch and scrambled to take off. He didn't have to hear the shouts to know that they'd been discovered. Donovan's first flight of a sky fighter was a rather harrowing one. Not only did he have to adjust to the delicacy of the controls but he also had to contend with the two fighters flying after him. Sancho found the chair that he was in was the back gunner's chair and managed to shoot one of the other fighters down. The second was taken care of by a mountain side when Donovan got the crazy idea to fly right through a tunnel.

Robin did her best not to freak out but she was never into thrill rides. She was the one who wanted to stay with her sister Katie when her family went on the roller coasters at the amusement park. Katie was far too small to go on them and Robin had been thankful that someone had needed to stay on the ground with her. She closed her eyes and hung on tight, thankful when they finally landed after yet another flying battle; this time with the group of fighters strafing the mountain camp where her family was.

They made it through the battle alive and managed to drive the Visitors off. But the mountain camp was in shambles. Robin stumbled through the smoke and flames looking for her family. She found them but not as she had hoped. Her father was clutching her two sisters; Polly aged twelve and a mirror image of their mother, and Katie aged five and dark like their father and Robin, to him. Their mother's body lay across a table nearby. It was the final straw. The stresses over the last 24 hours were too much and Robin broke down sobbing.

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"Wake him up damn it!" Martin could hear Diana yelling. He moaned. He did not want to have to deal with her. His head hurt. Wait a minute, why did his head hurt? The memory of Robin clocking him with his own pistol emerged from the pounding in his head. 'Guess I shouldn't have shown her where to hit,' he thought fuzzily. He recalled Robin had said something about him needing a story before she'd hit him. With that everything fell into place. He must be in the infirmary. He hoped that the Humans had made it.

"It looks like he's coming around," Steven said from where he stood behind Diana. Personally he rather liked Diana's aide. The man did a lot to make Steven's job easier. Handling Diana wasn't easy. But as Security Chief, he needed to know why Martin had gotten into that fighter with the Human girl.

Diana and the doctor she was arguing with turned towards the bed where Martin was now struggling to sit up. The doctor reached him first. "Lieutenant, I'm Doctor Reginald. I need you to answer a few questions for me." He then proceeded to run through the standard tests for a concussion. He didn't think that the young man was in any danger but he wasn't about to compromise any patients safety for the likes of these two senior officers. They had stripped off the lieutenant's Human body suit to check for injuries when he had first been brought in. He had seen the Battle Bride graft. Someone, probably Diana from what he knew of the woman's interests, had done this to the poor boy. He had to make sure he was alright before letting her get her claws into him.

Martin had no trouble interpreting the looks the elderly doctor was giving him. The mark of his Battle Bride would be all too obvious in his present state of undress. "I'm fine," he said and let the doctor know he was telling the truth with his eyes. "What happened?" he asked. He figured if the doctor was checking for a concussion he could fake some short term memory loss.

"The doctor informs me that you were hit in the head," Diana snapped. She had come into the infirmary to have her own slight facial wounds attended to when she saw her lieutenant being checked out. She still hadn't had time to fix her Human disguise and the half Human, half reptile appearance of her face was irritating.

"I checked the security logs. You were taking a Human girl with you in a sky fighter," Steven remarked. He wanted to get to the bottom of this quickly. He had more important tasks to complete; like figuring out how Donovan had gotten on board the mother ship in the first place.

Martin raised his right hand to rub his head. This was calculated to show off his bandaged arm. If Steven had seen the security tapes, then he had to have seen the same bandage on Robin. "I was taking her to get her some supplies. Food and stuff," he paused. "I can't remember anything else. I'm sorry Commander."

Diana nodded. It really didn't matter what he had been intending to do with the girl. She was just a means to an end. What was more important was Donovan and his infuriating ability to get into places where he didn't belong. And this time he had destroyed several of her sky fighters!

Steven's eyes widened when he saw the bandage on Martin's arm. 'Unlucky bastard,' he thought. 'He was probably going to dispose of her quietly where Diana wouldn't find out about it. The woman does have a sick fascination with these Humans but to force a Battle Bride on her lieutenant.' He wouldn't ask any more questions. There was no need to bring this to Diana's attention any further. It would be far better for Martin if Diana forgot all about the girl. "I have to see how the Human got in and out again with only you trying to stop him," he told Martin. "Diana, I'll see you later when I find those responsible."

"See to it!" she snapped. Then she turned on Martin. "Get dressed and get back to your duties." Martin nodded and climbed off the examining bed. It looked like he was going to get away with this. Maybe he could get Barbra to find some information for him on Human mating practices. He really needed to figure out where he screwed up.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Once the resistance had moved everyone down to the new base and Julie had patched up the injured, Robert Maxwell brought Robin in to see her. While the two scientists speculated as to why Diana had done the skin graft on Robin, Robin was determined to remain silent. Just in the last few hours she had heard her father, who was normally a very gentle man, spew out the most hateful and vicious things she had ever heard about the Visitors and what he'd like to do to them.

In a way she could sort of understand. She had heard that grief could change a person drastically and her mother had been murdered by the Visitors in the sky fighters. But where her father's grief and anger was mindless, striking out at all Visitors regardless, hers was much more focused. Martin had told her that morning that Diana would be leading the raid on the mountain camp. She had even more reason to hate the Visitor Science Officer now than she had before.

But she couldn't hate Martin. He had been very nice to her. He had made sure she had medical attention for her arm and food that she could eat. He had even tried to shield her from his eating habits although she had insisted on watching. It hadn't been as bad as she had thought it would be. At least as long as the mouse was dead. He had found a way for her to get off the mother ship, away from Diana and that bastard Brian and back to her family. Plus he was great at sex. She knew that made her a shallow person but at the moment she really didn't care. He'd made her come close to passing out from pleasure. Marriage to Martin had become less and less a bad prospect the longer she had been around him. He was better in bed than any Human guy she'd ever heard about from her friends.

While the rest of the resistance was going about figuring a way to get rid of the Visitors for good, Robin was stepping into the role of group Mom, or at least the local babysitter. Not only did she look after her little sisters, she also watched out for every child that had survived to make it to the resistance base in LA. There were more than she had realized before. All in all there were about fifteen kids under the age of fourteen. Most of their parents were doing their best to learn to fight and to keep themselves and their children alive. Robin stepped in to take care of things like who had hit who, to kiss boo boos, and to make sure that the kids had something to occupy them.

And those like poor Josh, who had lost both of his parents to the Visitors, well, Robin did her best for them too, when she wasn't learning her own lessons of war. But it wasn't fighting or spying that she was learning. She was learning how to be a nurse to Julie's doctor. Truthfully, neither one was qualified, but they were all that was available. Julie taught Robin when she could and there were a few books that they had managed to steal from the hospital that Robin studied.

Mostly Robin just tried to live from one day to the next. But the nausea she was experiencing most mornings wasn't helping. If she didn't know that it wasn't possible, she'd swear she was pregnant. But with Martin being a Visitor, that just wasn't possible. Maybe she had just picked up some sort of bug in the holding areas?

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The good news was that Barbra hadn't laughed her ass off at him when he had admitted what had happened to him. The bad news was that she didn't know much more about Human mating practices than he did. But she did know where to look. "The Humans actually publish reading material on the subject," she said as she led Martin to a small bookshop. It was a cozy place with chairs around tables and an even smaller coffee shop attached so that shoppers could read what they had purchased in comfort. Barbra came here often to check out the different literature that was available. She had also made friends with one of the local waitresses.

"Jenny, I need some help," she said as she dragged her superior officer to a corner table. Jenny waved and came over with a pitcher of water. She knew that it was the only thing on the menu that the Visitor would drink. Barbra gestured for Jenny to join them at the table and leaned forward. "This is Martin. Jenny, he met this Human girl and needs some help with your people's mating practices."

Jenny looked over at the male Visitor who had his face in his hand. Obviously Barbra's point blank way of asking about things wasn't a universal Visitor trait. She would have never known how blunt the alien woman could be if they hadn't gotten to be friends. Barbra had hardly talked at all the first time she had come in. But they had bonded over philosophy books and Barbra had slowly opened up to her. Now she was asking for help in getting her friend his girl. "I'm guessing that you don't know where to start or something went wrong?" she asked.

"It's a long story," Martin admitted after dropping his hand. Thank goodness Barbra had found someone willing to help, even if she had embarrassed the scales right off of him just now. "I think something went wrong, but I'm just not sure where."

Jenny reached over and patted his hand. "Don't worry so much. Things like that happen to Human guys too. Now, if I'm going to help, I need to know the circumstances." She settled in for the long story.

Martin tried to figure out just how he was going to explain this one. "We had sex and I thought things were fine but," he shrugged helplessly at her. "It's also more than just a single encounter sort of thing," he said hoping that would be enough.

Jenny realized that he wasn't going to give her the long story so she decided to settle for what she could get. "You don't need just sex advice, you need courting rituals," Jenny said and jumped up. She knew just where to go. There was a translated version of the Kama Sutra that she had in the back. Not only was it written in English, it also had a great deal of the background culture explained as well. Which was an especially good thing considering who she was going to give it to. It was her own copy that she had used for one of her college classes. Courting rituals were going to be a little harder.

She brought back the book to find that the two Visitors were sitting over their glasses of water like some Humans would be a couple of beers. Barbra was so obviously trying to cheer the poor guy up. "Ok, now this is considered to be the number one manual on Human sex ever written. This copy has a lot of stuff on the culture it was written in, so that the more obscure phrases and such are explained. If you get confused, bring it back and we'll talk. I know every inch of that book. One of my professors was obsessed with it so I really got to know it well." Jenny pushed over the book to Martin. "Now about courting customs, that's going to be harder. There are no hard and fast rules about courting."

"Courting is serious, correct?" Martin asked, wanting to get it right.

"Courting is what you do when you want to marry the girl," Jenny said bluntly.

"That's what I need," Martin nodded. "I need to honor her customs. I need to act honorably with her." He paused. "I'm just not so sure how to do that."

"Ok, first I need her background," Jenny said. "What race is she and where did she grow up?" Those were the very basic things that she needed to help this guy out. Silently she was cheering. She was a closet romantic and the thought of helping this poor alien win his girl was probably the matchmaking fix of the century, if not the millennium!

"She's Caucasian, and she grew up here in LA. She said that her background was middle class and nothing spectacular." Martin said nothing about her father's background as an anthropologist or that she and her family were resistance members. That would only get them all in trouble.

"Ok, that makes things a little easier. She has a similar background to mine. Now, the most important thing is that you need to get to know what she likes and what she doesn't like. Paying attention to her is vital." Jenny took out a notebook and pencil and handed them to him. "Take whatever notes you need," she coached. "The thing you need to do right now is get in contact with her. Make sure that she knows that you want to stay in contact. It doesn't need to be anything big, but she needs to know that you aren't about to love her and leave her. Doing that is very dishonorable."

She needed to teach him how not to act like a jerk. "Send her a letter if you can't talk to her in person for some reason. Send her flowers or candy; those are small gifts that show you want to continue things with her. If she doesn't like either of those things or you can't find them, send her something that she likes. It doesn't have to be big, but it shows your interest in her hasn't gone away when the sex ended." Martin nodded and started writing things down. He had a lot of studying to do.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Ruby had been a resistance member once before. She had been a young woman traveling through Paris when WWII had broken out and Germany had over run France. And now here she was teaching a new generation of people the things that she had learned about clandestine meetings and spying. She had been only a minor member of her French Resistance group and hadn't done anything really violent but she was good at spying. One of the reasons she had been, and was now, so good at it was that she was very observant about things around her. That was why she had noticed what was wrong with young Robin Maxwell.

Her connection to Robin was rather convoluted. Her best friend for years had been Abraham Bernstein. The Maxwell family had been Abraham's next door neighbors. Abraham's grandson and Robin had grown up together and Ruby had played grandmother to Daniel Bernstein, Robin, Polly and Katie Maxwell more often than not. While she didn't know what was up with the skin thing, she knew Robin well enough to figure out what her other condition was. And the fact that Robin didn't want her father to find out about it.

Ruby waited until Robert was out of the resistance headquarters before dragging Robin down to Julie's room. "I know that you don't want Robert to find out but you need to see Julie," she said. "You have to take care of yourself."

Ruby turned to Julie who had looked up from her bunk. "You need to examine Robin, Julie."

"Ruby thinks I'm pregnant," Robin explained exasperated. "But I can't be. It's impossible! I just picked up some kind of bug in the holding area or something." 'I can't be. Martin's a lizard. He's a very sexy lizard, but he's still a lizard,' Robin tried to convince herself.

Her thoughts went off in the direction they often went to when Martin came up, even in a round about way. Martin hadn't contacted her but it wasn't like he had her phone number. And she had been the one to say that he should stay where he was. He was just doing like she'd asked, right? He wasn't treating her like Brian would have, right? It was just Diana looking over his shoulder that kept him from sending her a note or something. 'Of course that's it. I'm his wife, not his one night stand,' she tried to convince herself. 'He wasn't the one who treated me like dirt.' That had been Brian.

"Well, let's check you out anyway," Julie said, her professional demeanor coming to the fore. She had noticed that Robin tended to rub the graft of Visitor skin when she was nervous or upset. Had something other than just the skin graft happened to her?

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Martin had finally managed to get in contact with Donovan when he wanted to, rather than the other way around. Not that it was a bad thing for the resistance man to be able to find him when it was necessary but he hadn't had the letter he had written to Robin on him when Mike found him. That really wasn't good. The information that he had read told him that the longer Robin went without contact from him, the more she would be likely to think she'd been used. "Mike," he breathed in relief at the sight of the Human.

"You needed to see me?" Donovan asked. While they couldn't get together often, he and Martin had seen each other about once every three weeks in the three months since the Visitor attack on the mountain camp. This time they were meeting in an old barn not far outside of LA.

"I've got some information for you," Martin said. "Steven has broken out his shock troops heavier armor. Soon your bullets won't work on them any more."

"Shit, are you sure?" Mike asked. It wasn't that he doubted his friend's word; just that he really didn't want to hear this.

"I'm sure," Martin said. "Your people needed to know right away that you'll need something with more penetrating power as soon as they start wearing it. And I," Martin squirmed a little. This wasn't going to be easy to explain. "I need you to do something for me."

"Sure, if I can," Mike answered. He had never seen Martin this nervous. Even when he had been talking Martin into letting him fly the sky fighter and Martin remaining on the mother ship, the Visitor hadn't been this nervous. Scared yes, but he hadn't been nervous. It also hadn't taken much time to talk him into staying. In fact, if it hadn't been for Robin clocking him, Mike would have said that Martin would have walked back onto the mother ship under his own steam. Instead, the look on Martin's face when the teen had hit him was a priceless memory. Mike was just glad that whatever story Martin had concocted had worked.

"I need you to give this to Robin Maxwell. She's the girl we got off the mother ship a few months ago," Martin said as he pulled out the letter. "Please don't read it. It's personal and has nothing to do with anything you need to know about."

"Robin? The one who clocked you?" Mike grinned. His alien friend was acting so uncomfortable that Mike could only jump to one conclusion. "Don't tell me you're sweet on her after that!"

"Mike!" Martin groaned. He knew the euphemism thanks to Jenny. Mike looked startled at the alien sound but his grin returned when he figured out what it was. "It's not like that! Well, sort of but," he sighed with frustration. "It's complicated," he finally managed to get out.

Mike sobered. "Her father hates Visitors. He'd probably strangle you with his bare hands if he got the chance. And that's without you making a play for his oldest daughter," he warned. Mike didn't want his friend to get hurt over something like this. War was one thing, courting a teenager whose father would like nothing more than to shove a shotgun where the sun didn't shine was something else again.

"She's my wife Mike," Martin said firmly. "Diana married us the night before. I offered to let your people divorce us, however you do that but she refused. She said that as long as I wasn't trying to kill her she wouldn't agree to it. My people don't have divorce at all. I need to let her know that well, that I meant what I told her. As far as I'm concerned, she's my wife until she says otherwise."

"Man what a mess," Mike said after a moment, thrown by the information. "Is that what the skin graft thing was all about? Or was the reason you wanted her off the mother ship so bad was because Diana was beginning to experiment on her?"

Martin smiled and tugged up his sleeve. His arm had healed. He cut the fake skin covering his arm and peeled it down to his wrist so that Mike could see the Battle Bride mark. "It's our version of a wedding band I guess you could say. A captured enemy female can be given as a Battle Bride to any loyal warrior who has proven himself if she isn't married. At least that's what it's supposed to be. Diana's not exactly an honorable officer in case you hadn't noticed." He leaned back against the wall of the barn and recovered his arm. It was still odd for him to see the band of Human skin. He hadn't gotten used to it yet. He wasn't sure he ever would.

"That bitch sure does know how to make things complicated doesn't she?" Mike asked rhetorically.

"Is there anything Robin needs or wants? Something I could send with you?" Martin asked as he pulled out a laser pistol power pack. He'd gotten into the habit of carrying a second one with him. He would sneak one out from maintenance and pass them on to Mike.

Mike took the power pack. Even with only a few pistols, it was better to have more ammunition than to be without it when it was needed. "She's studying to be a nurse and looking after the little kids." He shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine. I don't know her that well."

"Well, I guess I'll have to think of something," Martin muttered.

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Pregnant, she really was pregnant. Robin sat staring at the wall in shock. It wasn't possible but it was true. Julie had confirmed it with her exam. "Robin?" Julie asked. But Robin ignored her. How could this have happened? Every science course she had ever taken said that it was impossible for two different species, especially as different as mammals and reptiles were, to breed; unless Diana had done something? Robin knew she was a scientist.

Robin searched her memory of the short time she had spent on the mother ship, this time ignoring the memories of the sex she'd had with Martin. That was a bit difficult as they were the memories she had been focusing on. Could Diana have done something with that scanner thing? Or maybe, she thought hard. Yes, just before Diana had ripped Martin's skin off, she'd been injected with something. She hadn't been paying attention; rather she'd been actively trying to ignore Brian and Diana and concentrating on what Martin had been doing to her. Could that have been it?

"Honey, can you tell me what happened?" Julie asked. It was fairly obvious that Robin had been in some serious denial about her condition. That wouldn't be out of character for a rape victim. And Julie didn't think that she was far enough along to have been pregnant before she was held on the mother ship. She distinctly remembered the sullen teen Robin had been before that incident. Robin wouldn't have been sullen if she'd been dating anyone. A new boyfriend tended to make young girls very happy.

"You can't tell anyone," Robin turned to Julie. "Please, promise me you won't tell."

"Doctor/patient privilege Robin," Julie reminded her. "I'm not allowed to tell anyone anything that you tell me in confidence."

Robin nodded. Then she started to hesitantly tell her story. "I was taken to a holding cell. Three Visitors came in, one was Diana. The other two were men. One was holding a laser pistol to the other's head. Diana said that either he would have sex with me or he would be shot. I was scanned with something before I was sent to the cell. And when, well I think I was injected with something but I'm not sure."

Julie was stunned. "Then this child could be half Visitor? Was there ever anyone else?" For Robin's sake she hoped so. This was neither the time nor the place to be pregnant with the first half alien child.

Robin shook her head. "No, there's only been him." She rubbed her arm.

Julie touched the Visitor skin on Robin's arm. "And this?" she asked.

"It's his skin," Robin admitted. She couldn't tell anyone about what it meant.

"Do you want to keep the embryo?" Julie asked.

"Of course I do! It's my baby!" Robin reacted without thinking. She could no more have an abortion than she could get a divorce. Abortion was nothing less than murder. Besides, she couldn't face Martin one day and admit that she had killed their child. Besides, this child wasn't conceived in front of Diana and Brian. That had happened during their marathon session in Martin's quarters. It would be wrong to kill the result of something she had enjoyed so much.

"I had to ask," Julie said. "I guess we'll just see how things go then. But we do need to tell your father that you're pregnant. It won't be too much longer before you start to show."

"Ok," Robin agreed. Julie was right. She couldn't hide a pregnancy forever.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

There were very few letters exchanged between Martin and Robin, mostly because neither could really say anything that they were doing for fear that someone else would read their letters. Martin's letters were full of stories of he and his brother's exploits as children. Robin's were about her studies and stories of her and her sisters. But that small bit of reassurance was all the Robin needed. Knowing that she hadn't been abandoned by Martin had given her the courage to do what she had to do.

And she needed that courage to deal with the aftermath of the various raids that the older people were pulling off. Even worse was when they didn't pull off the raid, losing people and doing no significant damage to the enemy. Robin had never seen a person die before, much less while she was trying to save their lives. But she had now.

Polly was in the lizard room, the room that had cages full of reptiles that the scientists were experimenting on. Robin was with her and they were feeding the animals. "I wonder if this is what they look like without their body suits?" Polly wondered holding up one of the lizards.

Robin looked over. "Kinda," she said distractedly. "They're a darker green and they have shorter claws though."

"You saw one of them?" Polly's intention of picking a fight with her sister fluttered away in the view of this new information. She had planned on shoving the lizard into her sister's face. Robin could be such a pain. But this was far more interesting.

Robin shrugged. "I saw one of them take a shower. Well, a dust shower not a water one." She put the dish full of crickets in one of the cages. Just then one of her frequent bouts of morning sickness caught her and she ran out.

"Polly have you seen Robin?" Robert asked as he walked in.

"She went to puke again. Did she tell you that she saw a Visitor taking a shower without his body suit?" she asked eager to share the grotesque information.

"Thanks sweetie, I really needed to hear that," Robert said as he left in search of his oldest daughter. He found Robin in the bunk room where she and his other daughters slept. She was clinging to a bunk support

"Honey please, just tell me who the father is and I'll find him," Robert pleaded. "You shouldn't have to go through this alone." He wanted to support his daughter's decision but not knowing who had knocked his daughter up was killing him. He just prayed that she hadn't been raped. An accident under the sorts of conditions that she had been in while she was a prisoner was something that he could handle. Rape wasn't.

'That's what I'm afraid of,' Robin thought. "No," she insisted. "It wasn't supposed to happen. It was an accident. He doesn't need to know."

"Ok, ok, I'll stop asking," Robert relented. "If it's any consolation your mother always had pretty bad morning sickness too." It wasn't exactly a lie. Kathleen Maxwell really had, had terrible bouts of morning sickness during her three pregnancies. But Robin's was going on for far longer than Kathleen's had.

"Julie thinks that I may need to cut out some types of food; that maybe the baby can't handle them," Robin admitted. Julie had been talking about switching her to an almost totally raw food diet as that was more similar to what the Visitors ate.

"Is there anything I can get you?" Robert asked.

"Tea? The herbal stuff? It's almost the only thing I can drink," Robin admitted.

"One cup of tea coming right up," Robert promised. He kissed her forehead before heading off to the kitchen. Watching to make sure that her father really was out of the room Robin got up and walked over to the lone mirror on the wall. Once there she pulled her turtle neck away from her neck to expose a bluish-green mark at the base. The mark was slowly growing.

If Julie hadn't told her that it was probably a Visitor pregnancy symptom she would have been terrified. But Julie had dated this geek in high school who was into reptiles of all kinds. And one of the few things she had remembered was that when one of his pets had become pregnant the small lizard's skin had changed color. Julie had also cautioned her about informing her of any and all cravings she might have. With this child being half alien there was no telling what the baby might need in the way of nutrients and the best way to figure that out would be to listen to her body.

"Robin, because the baby is a Visitor there are going to be things that happen to you that aren't normal for a fully Human pregnancy. We just have to listen to what your body is telling us and then do what we can to accommodate what both you and the baby need." Robin would be glad when the baby was born. She was already tired of being pregnant. Maybe if she'd been able to share it with Martin it would have been different but with the war nothing was as it should be.

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Donovan and his people were up to something. That was nothing new but when he started getting cagy then Martin knew that the trouble coming was bigger than usual. Plus there was the fact that he was trying to get uniforms and weapons. Mike had asked for weapons before and Martin had managed to get a few to him but he had never asked for uniforms before.

Martin hadn't wanted to tell Mike that he couldn't get him any more weapons. But the truth was that strict track was now being kept. Uniforms were going to be easier. One of his Fifth Columnists worked in the morgue. It would be easy for him to get uniforms that wouldn't be missed.

Then there was the little matter of Sean Donovan. Martin owed Mike a lot for his own family life. He would have never have known that he was going to be a father himself if it wasn't for Mike telling him that Robin was pregnant. He understood why Robin hadn't told him. It wasn't something that could be written down and they couldn't meet face to face. That little revelation had sent him searching through Diana's records in an effort to figure out just how this miracle had been achieved. What he had found was that Diana had planned the entire thing. He didn't think that he would ever under stand that woman.

Diana's experiments had provided some of the biggest scientific breakthroughs in the last decade. But the way she worked had become more and more erratic and less scientific with the more power she acquired. It was more like a child pulling parts off of their food to see what would happen before the meal died than a serious scientific study. The trouble was that she was still a great scientist. Even when she threw scientific reasoning out the porthole, she still achieved things that should have been impossible.

How could he possibly get Sean out? The boy was going to have to be revived before anything else and that required expertise that he didn't have. Well, first he was going to have to find the boy. He had narrowed down where he was to a section but he'd have to have a picture to find his exact location. He hoped that Mike could get him one. He didn't want Mike to lose his son. He didn't want to lose his child either. He remembered with chilling clarity Mike's assessment of Robin's father's feeling towards Visitors.

Martin leaned back in his chair and considered the difficulties of reviving the boy and then getting him off the ship. Just then Steven marched into his quarters. "Steven?" he asked. "Is something wrong?"

Steven threw down a computer disk. "You have a message from the home world. It's sealed under a House Heir sigil. Why?" Steven demanded.

'Crap,' Martin thought. 'I should have remembered that Kkkeesk would feel my pain.' That was one of the things about him and his brother. When one was hurt, the other felt it. They could also feel each other's strong emotions if they were on the same planet. No one outside of his immediate family was aware of this quirk between the twins. In fact, it wasn't mentioned anywhere in the medical literature either. His family had done their best to keep this information a secret. It would be all too easy for someone like the Leader to turn this link into a weapon, either for his own use or against the twins.

Martin sighed and took the disk. He knew that Steven shouldn't have tried to open it. House messages were supposed to be kept private. But that was just one more thing that was becoming a thing of the past under the Leader. Martin opened the message and found what he expected; a mishmash of Visitor writing that said 'Who is she?'. There was nothing else.

"Is that a code?" Steven demanded over his shoulder.

"No, it's a written version of a spoken language that exists only among my immediate family," Martian admitted. Actually it only existed between him and his brother. It was their secret language, one that no one had ever been able to understand.

"What does it say?"

"Someone informed my family that I was given a Battle Bride. They want information on her," Martin said flatly.

"But why would they send that under a House Heir sigil?" Steven asked. Then he face cleared. Martin had opened the message with his palm print. "You are the House Heir?" he asked quietly. It wasn't unusual for some Houses to send their heirs into service under a cloak of secrecy. It gave the heir a good look at politics from the ground up and it protected them from being used as a pawn.

"My brother is now," Martin said. "I no longer qualify. I have to answer this if you don't mind, Steven."

Steven nodded and quickly left. It was a good thing that his career was no longer attached to Diana's. What she had done would earn her a quick death sentence along with anyone who had helped her. He should do what he could to help Martin. Even as a former House Heir, the lieutenant would have a lot of power one day and he would remember those who helped him in his time of difficulties.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

A/N: A quick response about Visitor society in answer to a review. Martin is not Royalty! Visitors have (at least here) a tribal type society where each House (tribe) sends a representative to a ruling council. The Leader has taken over that council. Martin and his brother Philip are not sons of the Leader. They are sons of a House Leader.

'Well, Julie warned me that this might happen.' Robin had gotten up in the middle of the night hungry and rather sleepily had munched down on a plate of meat that she had found in the fridge. The trouble was that it was raw. When she had woken up enough to realize what she was doing she had merely sighed and finished the plate. At least the baby wasn't interested in mice like Martin was.

The next morning she had told Julie about her craving and the fact that she had finished off the meat. "Well, it won't kill you to eat raw meat once in a while as long as it doesn't have any e-coli bacteria." Julie paused to consider how to deal with this new development. "Don't do it anymore until we can find you a better supply of meat. Meat becomes infected with the harmful strains of e-coli when it isn't prepared properly. I want to make sure that you don't have to worry about it if you have another craving for raw meat. You should increase the amount of cooked meat you're eating until I can find a better supplier. Hopefully that will lessen the craving."

Robin nodded. "At least the baby doesn't want something alive," she pointed out her thought from the night before.

"Oh Lord," Julie grimaced. "I hadn't even thought about that."

"Thoughts like that keep me from freaking out," Robin said with a grin. "I've seen them eat. So in comparison, this isn't so bad." Julie had to agree. Eating raw meat once in a while was far preferable to eating something that was still alive.

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Martin was furious. He had almost figured out a way to get Sean out and Donovan pulled this little stunt! Sending Walsh into section 34 was not only stupid; it had disrupted his attempt at a dry run. Yelling at Mike did provide him with a little satisfaction but it wasn't what he really wanted to do. He was just frustrated that he couldn't turn Sean over to Mike already.

After Martin had finished yelling they settled down to talk about the plan Mike had put together to expose John on television. That plan was almost as crazy as the last one. Martin was coming to understand that crazy was Donovan's normal mode of operations. He wondered if the now deceased Tony had ever managed to slow Mike down. Going over the plan, Martin realized that yes; there was a possibility that the LA resistance could pull this off, if they had a little bit of help. He would have to sabotage the computers so that they couldn't shut down the transmission as well as finding someone to pilot the shuttle that would help most of the resistance members escape. He ran through the members of the Fifth Column in his head, looking for a pilot that could help and wouldn't be missed. Too bad he couldn't be that pilot. He'd like to see Robert Maxwell for himself.

What he'd really like would be to see what he was up against in the form of his father in law. There was a great deal that you could tell about a person in a battle situation. While he didn't think that Robert would pose much of a threat to him personally in a hand to hand situation, that wasn't the only way Robert could kill him. Or worse, he could take his hatred out on Robin and the baby. Martin just didn't know enough about the man to know which way he would jump. That was far more stressful.

Mike's comment on being negative and giving himself an ulcer wasn't that funny. With as much stress as he was under, an ulcer was actually a possibility. Fortunately no one bothered to notice or if they did they didn't bother to comment, on the fact that he had increased his number of martial arts sessions in the gym from weekly to almost daily. They all assumed that he was dealing with the stress of dealing with Diana. Between hitting stuff and people in the gym and the meditation sessions in his quarters he was just maintaining his equilibrium.

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The first inkling that Robin had that a Visitor was in the resistance base was when Robert and Julie brought Willie into the lab. They were so busy running tests on his blood that they didn't notice that he was rubbing his wrist. Casually Robin walked over to where he was sitting, hoping that her father wouldn't notice. "Are you alright?" she asked.

"Yes, thank you," Willie replied.

When Robin asked him if he knew Brian it wasn't because she was eager to see the snake again. Well, not in the romantic sense anyway. She had thought long and hard about her last encounter with the Visitor. She had finally decided that it wasn't so much the fact that he had held a pistol to Martin's head that had upset her. It was the fact that he had laughed. And what was worse in some ways was the fact that he had been laughing at Martin, not at her. She hadn't even registered to him at all.

She might as well have been a painting or something. Or even worse, she might as well have not been there at all. There hadn't been a crueler way for him to tell her she was nothing. And she wasn't indifferent to how he had treated Martin either. Martin had treated her right. He had paid attention to her rather than just getting the job done so he wouldn't be shot. He was also helping the resistance out because it was the right thing to do. He was actually putting his life in danger to help her people against his own! Brian had to pay for the way he had treated them. She didn't know how or when, but he was going to pay. Of course she wanted Diana to pay too but her treatment of them in the cell was actually far down Robin's list of grievances against the Science Officer. Much higher on the list was the murder of her mother.

Willie hadn't known Brian but did ask about her baby. Robin had thought that he was talking about her obviously bulging stomach at five months. But he hadn't, instead talking about how the mark on her neck was almost all the way around. Robin clutched at the handkerchief that she had stupidly allowed to gap open and looked over to where her father and Julie were sitting.

Her luck had run out. Robert had heard and put two and two together and come up with a Visitor baby. "I'll kill the bastard," Robert muttered before turning to Julie. "You're going to abort that thing and do it now!"

"Robert!" Julie protested and Robin said, "No!" But Robert Maxwell was listening to neither.

Even when cooler heads tried to prevail by having Willie taken to a cell and having a discussion about the situation Robert held firm. Mike, Julie, Robin and Father Andrew, a grizzled Catholic priest who had served in South Africa in his youth, all tried to get Robert to back down from his stand that the baby be aborted. Mike talked about how the risks weren't his to take. It was Robin's body and her child; she should be the one making the decision. Julie told him how dangerous the abortion could be. Robin flat out told her father that it was murder and she wanted her baby. Father Andrew tried to make him see the larger picture; that this child could be the bridge between their peoples and the start of the ending of the war.

"Mike, Father Andrew with all due respect to both of you, butt out! We are talking about my daughter not yours. Robin is only seventeen. She's a minor and this is my decision not any one else's. She is having this abortion. Julie you will do it," Robert insisted, ignoring his daughter completely.

Julie was sick to her stomach. She had never wanted to perform an abortion, although she had assisted at one once. She had gone to medical school to help save lives, not to take them. But her ethics classes had made this situation perfectly clear. As long as Robin was a minor, then Robert was the one to make her medical decisions. "I'll set things up at the hospital," she whispered.

Robin cried, begged and pleaded with everyone right up until she was on the surgical table at the hospital. If it wasn't for the fact that people would have died if she'd kicked up a bigger fuss, due to the fact that this was being done at that hospital, she would have fought them as well. Finally Julie couldn't stand it any more and sedated her.

Two resistance members stood guard outside the surgical room, Elias Taylor and Brad Johnson. They were a study in differences and the strange bedfellows that standing up for what was right could make. Elias was a self proclaimed ex-hood and the skinny young black man had become part of the resistance at the death of his older brother, a doctor. Brad was an ex-cop. He had joined the resistance because he had nearly been killed by the Visitors for protesting their taking over.

"Man I'm glad they shut her up," Elias whispered. "I mean, I get that she doesn't want to do this but I just don't understand why. I can't imagine having one of those lizards crawling around inside of me and wanting to keep it."

Brad looked over at his partner with sympathy. "I've never been able to understand it but I've seen it before." Elias threw him a puzzled look. "Rape victims that are also very religious have a tendency to say, 'it's god's will' as a coping mechanism. It's god's will that this happened to me. It's god's will that I got knocked up. That sort of thing," he said. He shrugged. "All you can do is try to help the lady out as much as possible. Personally I think that Robert's doing the right thing."

Back in the surgical room everyone was stunned at the outcome of the attempted abortion. The baby wouldn't let them perform the abortion. Every time either Julie or Fred, the sympathizer doctor that Julie had gotten to help, tried to cut even one of the hundreds of umbilical cords connecting Robin and the baby, Robin's vital signs dropped. They nearly lost her twice before Julie insisted on stopping. Julie was actually thankful that she could honestly tell Robert that there was no way to abort the baby. Robin was going to have to carry the child to term and they were going to have to deliver it.

"Robert, I want to make this perfectly clear," Julie said as she and Robert stripped out of their scrubs. "The only reason you got this far was because you are Robin's father and she is still underage. If you so much as dare to lay a single hand on this child after it is born I will kill you myself."


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Robin was so relieved that she was still pregnant. As much as she had tried to understand her father's rage at the Visitors, this was one thing that she couldn't. Babies were complete innocents. They did not ask to be conceived. That was the responsibility of a child's parents. Her parents had drilled into her head for years that very simple concept; and the likelihood of pregnancy if she had engaged in sex before getting married. Which she hadn't, but her marriage to Martin was beside the point because her dad didn't know about it.

It was one of the reasons she had been a virgin when she'd married Martin. She wasn't a slut. She had never met anyone she liked well enough to get pregnant for. Not that she had been planning on staying a virgin forever, but she wasn't about to get birth control until she was out of her parent's house. She couldn't imagine facing her mother with a box of condoms between them. Even now with her mother dead, the very thought brought a blush to Robin's face. The point was she had been determined to be old enough and responsible enough to not get pregnant when she did start fooling around. Getting pregnant seriously hampered any extra curricular activities, not that she was able to do anything with the war going on.

The one part of her well, rather nebulous plan that had come true, was that she was in a serious and stable relationship with her baby's father. You couldn't get any more serious than married to someone who considered divorce to be as alien as she did. Of course for Martin the thought was literally alien. Robin smiled through her tears as she curled up on her bunk.

"Hey are you Robin?" a new voice asked.

Robin looked up to see an older woman, in her late twenties or early thirties, with long curly blond hair and blue eyes standing in her doorway. She nodded.

"I'm Harmony. Can I ask you some questions? If it's not the right time or anything I understand. It's just that I was on a date with Willie and I really need someone to talk to." Harmony paused. People had told her that Robin's child was a Visitor and it was a toss up as to whether or not she'd been raped. Robin refused to name which Visitor had fathered her child. After all the fuss that had happened when it was discovered that her child was a Visitor, Harmony could understand.

Robin remembered that Willie was the Visitor she had been talking to when her dad had found out about the baby. "Sure," Robin said and did her best to sit up, wiping her face. It would do her good to quit thinking about her dad. It wasn't easy to sit up and Harmony hurried to help her. Then she sat down on the bunk next to Robin.

"I guess my biggest question is, do you still like the guy? I mean, I understand you don't want anyone to know who he is, so I'm not asking that. But I'm really on the fence about Willie. I thought he was a really nice guy but he lied to me. They all did so I guess what I'm really asking is, does that make a difference for you now that you know?" Harmony rung her hands. She wasn't kidding when she said that she needed someone to talk to, preferably someone who was in a similar situation.

It took a moment for Robin to realize what she was talking about. "When I first realized he was a reptile, I mean when I had time to realize it, he said something that showed just how much of a regular guy he was. I burst out laughing," Robin admitted. "From what I've seen, the only thing that most Visitors are hiding is the fact that they're reptiles. Their personality comes through loud and clear."

"Really?" Harmony asked. She wanted to believe that.

"Yes," Robin said firmly. "From what's been passed through Mike Donovan by the Fifth Column, only about half of the Visitors even know what their real mission here is."

"Willie wouldn't have been one of them. He's just a technician." Harmony said thoughtfully. "They even screwed up his assignment. He was supposed to go somewhere in the Middle East and learned Arabic. Instead they sent him here to LA where he barely speaks the language. He gets English mixed up a lot. It's kind of cute," she admitted with a little smile.

Robin nodded. "But for him to be able to speak two alien languages even that well means that he's probably very smart," she pointed out.

Harmony nodded. "He just gets similar words mixed up. We went out to the movies and he tried to tell me about something like them that they have on his homeworld. He's smart and sweet. It's a killer combination for me. Most of the Human guys I know are complete jerks."

"Don't let the fact that he's a reptile scare you off. Nice guys are too hard to find to let one go just for that," was Robin's opinion.

"You're right. God, the number of bozos I've dated! I was willing to hang on to Willie when I knew he wasn't from Earth. I shouldn't go making judgment calls like that now that I know just how alien he is." Harmony perked up and leaned over. "How good are they in bed?"

Robin giggled and settled in for some serious girl talk. She hadn't had a good gossip session in months.

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It was time for the big party. Robin was amused that on one hand the resistance was getting ready for one of their biggest attacks on the Visitors to date and yet at the same time, they really were getting ready for a party. She and Harmony were helping Julie with her hair, makeup and dress as well as prepping their makeshift hospital. It was Robin who had sent Elias, easily their best break in man, back to her old home after clothes for the party. Her parents had been going to university functions for more years than she could remember. Not only did Julie need a dress and wrap, so did some of the other ladies. Plus her father had a tux in the back of his closet too.

While she wasn't speaking to her father unless it was business, she did care what happened to him. That was one of the reasons that she was watching the event on TV. Her father had one of the staring roles in this drama. He was the one giving Julie her back up. And Julie was the one who was going to rip John's face off. Ripping off the fake face of the Supreme Commander on international TV would hopefully wake more than a few people up to what was going on around the world. At the very least it would show that the Visitors weren't as fully in charge as they thought.

All of the kids, plus Harmony, Robin and those few whose job would come later that night sat around a small TV set watching the televised party. They all sighed in relief when Julie and Robert got through the security at the door. Their fake security passes worked. They watched in anticipation as the LA resistance did what they had said they would. They showed the world what the Visitors were. Then they ran.

In anticipation of casualties, Robin and Harmony got the children to bed. They knew that the less of the aftermath of violence that the children had to witness the better. By the time the fighters returned, all was in readiness. Unfortunately while they were prepared for the few minor casualties, they weren't prepared for the worst.

"Where's Julie?" Robin asked as the fighters came pouring down the stairs.

"They got her," was Mike's curt reply.

"She's DEAD?!?!" Robin shrieked in panic.

"NO! I mean they got her," Mike said hurriedly. "We'll get her back!" he swore.

Fortunately the only injuries were minor as Robin and Harmony were now the only medical personnel in the entire resistance. Oh Brad and Mark had first aid training as they had both been police officers before but that didn't qualify them to do very much. Harmony on the other hand, was almost through her studies to be a nurse and Robin had done her learning under fire.

Ruby found Robin later sobbing on her bed. "What is the matter child?" she asked. It wasn't as if she couldn't guess but it would be better for Robin to say it.

"I'm the most awful person in the world!" Robin wailed. She threw herself (as much as she was able to being nearly six months pregnant) in Ruby's arms. "When Mike said that the Visitors had Julie all I could think of was that I needed her! She probably being tortured right now and I'm such a selfish brat!" she broke down sobbing again.

"No you're not. It's a perfectly reasonable reaction. I know what Julie promised you and what you're really worried about is your baby. You're not wishing harm to come to Julie or thinking of her as your slave who only exists for you," Ruby said calmly. "Don't you worry now. We'll all make sure that the baby is safe. And we'll bring Julie home too, you'll see." She rocked the pregnant teen to sleep.

On the other side of the doorway Robert Maxwell stood listening to the conversation. He too remembered Julie's promise. He just didn't understand why people seemed to think that he was the bad guy in all of this. His daughter had been raped. She was pregnant with an alien child who wasn't likely to survive and would be at best a malformed monster if it did live. He had only been trying to spare his daughter the anguish of having to care for a child with special needs that could only remind her of being raped! Why did everyone seem to think that he was going to kill the child after it was born? Terminating a pregnancy under these circumstances was one thing; killing a child who had managed to survive was another. He would have to deal with the situation later. They still had to get through the rest of the pregnancy. And right now, he had to help get Julie back.


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

The next day everything changed. Ham Tyler, also known as The Fixer and his friend Chris Faber arrived at the resistance. Ham was a professional soldier who usually worked for the CIA. These days he worked for a network of resistance groups all over the world.

Unfortunately the Visitors also came to the resistance headquarters but they weren't there to help. They were there to crush the resistance. It wasn't Julie who had talked of course. It had been the Pascal, the counterfeiter. Still, the end result was the same. They had to move. Tyler and Chris took the rear guard for the resistance members who evacuated to a new location when the Visitors arrived, one that Julie didn't know about. It was a harsh fact of war. When someone who knew the details of your underground was captured, you had to change those details.

The new headquarters was an old abandoned movie lot. It had been some kind of western with quite a few functioning buildings and while it had all been abandoned years before they were still functional. While they were getting settled in Harmony finally had a chance to talk to Willie alone. They both quickly came to realize that they both felt the same way about each other and decided to put the whole Visitors are lizards and they want to eat us thing aside. After all, Willie didn't want to hurt anyone. He was far too kind hearted to want too, and Harmony knew that.

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On the Visitor's homeworld, in a large underground chamber sunk deep into the rocks below a sea of sand, a Visitor was throwing things around a in a classic temper tantrum. "HOW DARE SHE!!!!!" The Visitor's immediate family was gathered in the room with him. Unlike a normal situation where they would be attempting to sooth and calm the older male, they too seethed with anger. This time the Leader's Consort had gone too far.

"Kkkiiiistk says she is his bride. She meets all of the necessary requirements. She is even carrying his child thanks to that psychotic slime-screed!" a younger male growled. "It matters not to him that she is Human."

"HE is an honorable man and honors the position of Battle Bride. It is that witch who defiles it!" growled an older female. "Even if his bride does carry his child, it should never have happened. And that she-devil should never have touched my son's genetics to create such a child! The Leader's choice to throw honor to the great winds will destroy us all!" She said the last with great finality. It wasn't just the fact that the Leader had made war on the Houses of the other continent. They had been fighting with them for generations and one more Leader who was willing to fight the enemy was nothing new.

What was new was that they had never had a Leader who was willing to throw away so much of their honor to win. "Enough! This is the final insult." The older male went to sit on what could only best be described as a simple throne. "From this moment on our House will no more obey the Leader. Spread the news far and wide, those who will join us are welcome to asylum in our Sanctuary. We will add them to our House if they so wish. Any Human who wishes to join our cause is welcome here; not as cannon fodder, but as equals. Any who can be captured from the Leader's forces, whether they be our kind or Human will be treated with the respect with which they are due. This House now goes to war!"

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Mike had a plan or at least the beginnings of a plan to get Julie back. Tyler was sure that Julie was either converted or a gibbering idiot and in either case it wasn't worth trying to get her back. However he did back down long enough to agree to meet with Martin. It turned out that it wasn't exactly a good thing for Tyler.

After Mike had introduced Ham Tyler to Martin and vice versa, Taylor started in on his usual nasty attitude. "Stow it Tyler," Mike said and then turned to Martin. "How's Julie?"

"Diana is trying to convert her," Martin began, "but she's having a few technical problems. Nothing that will hurt Julie but she won't be converted until the sabotage is corrected." Martin smirked. He had known that sooner or later he would have to interfere with a conversion. The problems that he had introduced would look like sloppy maintenance. "But it won't last for long."

"Oh and I'm sure that you're really broken up about that," Tyler sneered.

Martin could and would put up with Tyler's bigoted attitude, mostly because thanks to Diana and the rest of the Visitor Leadership it had been earned; but Tyler's implication that he didn't care if Julie was converted or not tipped the scales that he had been balancing on for six long months. Julie was the source of the only real medical care that Robin had and her and his child's only chance at survival. Martin saw green. And Tyler saw red as Martin attacked. As far as Tyler was concerned the attack came out of nowhere. One minute he'd just been mouthing off and the next 'Gooder's' little lizard buddy was kicking his ass.

Mike was startled at the fact that Martin had lost his temper and at how fast his friend was moving. What he wasn't surprised at was the fact that Martin was winning. Thanks to his hanging out with scientists for the last several months he knew that reptiles were surprisingly strong and Martin's precise movements showed that he was probably a professional. Ham Tyler wasn't that good at hand to hand combat. He wasn't bad but he preferred to use weapons and explosives to hand to hand. It was no wonder that Martin was winning.

Mike waited for a second before doing his best to drag Martin off of Tyler. He had to wait until Martin had knocked Tyler into a wall before he could safely grab him. "Martin we need him! I told you I don't like him either but he's our source for the teflon ammo we need! Without that we can't get Julie back! You know Steven's troopers are using their stronger armor!"

Martin stopped as the information slammed into him. He shook Mike off with a curse and stalked away a few steps. He worked on calming his temper while Donovan checked Tyler. "She's Robin's only chance Mike," he whispered as Mike came back over to him.

"I know," Mike whispered, "but he doesn't yet. Not only has he not met Robin yet, Robin hasn't told anyone who the father of her child is. I think that's mostly to protect you." Martin nodded. "Listen I have an idea on how to get Julie out." Mike went on to explain his idea but Martin shook his head.

"It would never work Mike, but it does give me an idea. I just needed one last thing." Martin nodded sharply. "Get your people ready. I'll have Julie and some other prisoners transferred to security headquarters within the next three days. Julie will have a few nightmares to contend with and she'll probably be drugged for the transfer but she'll be alright."

Mike frowned, his mind racing. Then he grinned, "You lead Julie from the shuttle into the building. We'll shoot you, nothing more than a flesh wound, but when you go down that's when we'll attack."

"Good, I'll send you the details as soon as I can." With that Martin walked out. He didn't even look back at Tyler.

Donovan shook his head at the sight of the battered man and helped him back into their truck before getting in himself and driving away. "What the hell's wrong with him?" Tyler asked. "I didn't say anything that didn't need to be said. I admit I was mouthing off but that was no reason for him to try and beat the shit outa me."

Mike glanced over across the cab of the truck, assessing the other man. Tyler was bleeding and hurt, but he wasn't too badly beaten aside from a few broken ribs. Mike knew that one of the few things Tyler would appreciate was classified information, especially if he was in on it. "This is classified Tyler. No one outside of me, Martin and Robin Maxwell know this." He paused until Tyler nodded his head and agreed to keep the information to himself. "Six months ago Robin was captured and taken up to the mother ship. Diana in one of her more psychotic moves married Martin and Robin. Martin got Robin to us but not before Diana somehow managed to get Robin pregnant with Martin's child. Everyone knows that Robin's baby is a Visitor but no one outside the three of us knows that Martin is the father. The reason that Martin lost his temper with you is that Julie is our only doctor. Robin and the baby stand a good chance of dieing without her."

Ham Tyler froze for a split second. "They're really hitched? I mean, they both accept it?" he asked quietly. Mike nodded. He knew about Tyler's past but wouldn't say anything. And Tyler wouldn't either. The spectral image of Tyler's own wife and small daughter, lost in another war along time ago, simply drifted between them, acknowledged but not spoken of. "Your lizard buddy hits hard," Tyler finally said. He wasn't going to let go of his hatred for the Visitors, but Martin had earned his respect.

Back at the movie set, Mike helped Tyler into their makeshift infirmary. They were followed by a half a dozen fighters, including Tyler's friend Chris. "What happened?" Chris demanded. The others wanted to know as well.

Tyler just shrugged. "Donovan's lizard buddy packs a mean punch," was all that he would say. Chris helped him up onto a table where two young women began to check him out. One was a dark haired teen and Tyler stared at the lizard skin on her arm and the weird greenish mark around her neck. She wasn't hiding the marks either. She had tied her hair up and was wearing a t-shirt so that everyone could see just how big the mark on her neck was. She was also very pregnant. This had to be Robin Maxell.

"What did you do?" Robin demanded. She was carefully wiping the dried blood off of Tyler's face.

"I accidentally pushed a button that I didn't know was there," Tyler admitted. "I figure I deserve what I got after Donovan gave me the background info."

"Well don't go and do it again," Robin said sternly. "Martin's got enough on his plate without you pushing him. Did you know that the Visitor commanders are depending on him to keep Diana in line? That's what his job is; too make sure that she doesn't go too far. But he is her aide so he can't just tell her when she's stepping over the line or she'll kill him. Plus there is the whole running the Fifth Column thing, which is a very hard job to do for him, seeing as how he's stuck dealing with most the high command watching over his shoulder all the time."

"How do you know that?" Chris asked, impressed. That sort of job wasn't easy and he had to have been doing it for a while if these people trusted him as much as they did.

"I got captured six months ago. Martin got me out. I was sitting in a corner when he had to deal with no less than three commanders coming in and yelling at him," Robin explained.

"Well the good news is that he's got a plan to get Julie out and she hasn't been converted yet. Martin's had the conversion chamber sabotaged. We move sometime in the next three days," Mike said, happy to give this order. Everyone scurried to check out their weapons and ammo supplies. Three days wouldn't give them much time but it was their best chance and it was one that they were happy to take.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

One day later a small package arrived from Martin through a few intermediary contacts. Inside was a video tape and a short note. '10 o'clock on the 9th. By the way, I thought that you'd get a kick out of seeing this.' Needless to say, everyone was curious as to what was on the tape. Mike set it up in the saloon and everyone gathered around to watch the tape.

To their utter delight, it was a Visitor security tape that showed Diana throwing a fit at her discovery that the dead person on a morgue slab in front of her that she had thought was Mike Donovan, was in fact one of her own people in disguise. Martin, Steven and another Visitor female that they didn't know watched her. When Martin made the suggestion to move all of their important political prisoners to the security headquarters, Diana had snarled, "See to it" before stalking out with Martin at her heels.

To the resistance members surprise the tape didn't end there. "Is she always so; excitable?" the woman asked looking after Diana.

"Well, yes," Steven said. Then a calculating look came over his face. "I have to admit Commander, that without Martin to steady her, I'm truly fearful that she would have completely lost it by now. He's done quite well at a job that is getting exceedingly more difficult as time goes on."

"Oh? Perhaps she just needs a bit of a rest?" the Visitor Commander said archly. "The stress of her position can be very difficult under these circumstances after all." The implications weren't wasted on Steven, nor were they wasted on the resistance members. Discord in the ranks of the enemy was never a bad thing.

Tyler took the tape and by the end of the day had made copies of both it and stacks of pictures of the Visitors in it. He passed the pictures out at dinner, walking around the tables and handing them to people. "Ok people, I want you to take a good look at these. Memorize these people because it looks like this is the new lizard in charge of the second mother ship that just arrived. The dark haired one is Steven and as you already know, he's in charge of security. It's his job to keep us from succeeding in throwing their lizard asses off this planet. Everybody knows Diana but I figured more than one of you would like a target to practice with," Tyler said with a grin. Dark laughter met this statement. "The last guy is Martin, our friendly neighborhood Fifth Columnist. That means that if you have him in your sites, you don't kill him." No one noticed that the picture he handed to Robin was Martin. While he was sure that the girl would have gotten her hands on a picture of her husband without his help, this way she didn't have to try and sneak one off. Ham Tyler was a very hard man but he did have a soft spot for women in her circumstances, so much like his own dead wife's.

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Ruby, in her disguise as a cleaning woman, had gotten a hold of the security building's plans. As she was the only one with access to the building, Donovan and Tyler planned the raid around her. She had to pull the plug on the building's power when Martin went down so that they could get the rescue detail through the electric fence that surrounded the building. When Robin had objected to her staying in the building during the raid, Ruby was the one who pointed out that an explosive device could be found before they were ready to set it off. "I know you're just worried about me, child. But let me tell you this, if I die during this raid, I'll count it as worth my life. Not only will we be getting Julie back, but we'll be freeing a lot of other people from them as well. Most of the time that's something we can't do, so I think that it's worth dieing for, not that I want to die mind you," she said.

"And that's something I wanted to remind people," Mike said. He was standing at the front of the room they were using to plan the raid. "There is a lot more than just Julie at stake here. Martin is using this as an excuse to move all of their political prisoners to where we can get at them. Tyler and Chris will move the ones we rescue out of LA and get them to safety. We have a chance to save a lot of lives here, so be careful and grab as many people as you can. Those of you on the perimeter, be careful not to shoot any of us on rescue detail! Friendly Fire Isn't! The fewer casualties we have right now the better. Caleb, you'll be driving the first rescue truck. Sancho, you'll be driving the second." Both men nodded, comfortable now with the idea of driving a vehicle through a fire fight. "The rest of you, throw the people you get a hold of into the back of the trucks. Don't worry about any injuries they may have. We'll get them patched up when we get them back here. If worst comes to worst, I'm sure they'd rather die free than in the hands of the Visitors." More than one head nodded at that simple truth.

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Raid Night

The Visitors made it ridiculously easy to figure out which person was a prisoner and which wasn't, even with all of the prisoners in plain Visitor uniforms. Each one was escorted by a shock trooper, save Julie and the troopers were positioned between the prisoners and the open areas around the security headquarters. Julie was escorted by Martin. Tyler took the job of shooting Martin. Not only was he the best qualified for it, it was also a good choice for a little payback for the broken ribs that Martin had given him a few days before, even if he didn't intend to give the Visitor anything more than a flesh wound.

When Martin fell down from Tyler's shot to his leg, dragging Julie with him, Chris radioed Ruby to kill the power. The lights went out along with the power to the electric fence amidst the confusion of the resistance members shooting the still standing troopers. Once the power was out the rescue teams ran in and threw the prisoners in the back of the two trucks as they swept by at low speed. Mike was the one to sweep Julie up and into a truck, flinging himself in after her. The raid was a success with only a single fatality on the resistance' side.

That fatality, as Robin and others had feared, was Ruby. The worst part for Robin was the fact that it wasn't a Visitor guard who had stumbled across the elderly lady in the basement, but Daniel Bernstein. The fact that Daniel was a traitor was something Robin had come to accept over the last seven months. The idea that he could shoot the woman who had acted as their grandmother for their entire lives was something that shocked and horrified her. Although she could and did, pour her sorrow over the act onto Harmony's shoulders, she also wrote to Martin. It wasn't something she could hold back from him. She did her best not to name names but she did feel better for writing to him about it. With Harmony she could cry but with Martin she could express her sheer rage at a boy she had considered her adopted brother killing the only grandmother she had ever known as her own grandparents were dead. What few knew was that Ruby had touched Ham Tyler as well. And he had a plan for one Daniel Bernstein, one that would take time and careful planning to carry out.

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Julie stood up at dinner in the communal mess hall the next night. The drugs had worked their way out of her system and Robin and Harmony had said that she was fine as far as they could tell. "Ok everyone; I'm sure that you all have questions about what happened to me so I figured I would give my report now so you could all hear it." Everyone waited in silence, not knowing what to expect. "First, when they figured out who I was Diana scheduled me for conversion. I was drugged into partial unconsciousness and placed in the conversion chamber. That's when something went wrong for Diana. For some technical reason the machine wouldn't turn on."

"Martin had someone sabotage it," Mike interrupted.

Julie grinned, "Well, it looked like someone hadn't been taking care of the machine and Diana was pissed. They sent me back to a holding cell until they could fix the problem. After it was fixed they tried again. This time the machine worked but just as they were getting started, someone we all thought was Mike ran into the room and started shooting the place up. Whoever it was died from multiple laser blasts and once more the machine needed to be repaired so I was sent back to the holding cell. Sometime after that I was again drugged but instead of being taken to the conversion chamber, I was taken to a shuttle. Then you rescued me. Thanks everyone. It means a lot that you came after me."

"And on that happy note," called Caleb as he and Elias ducked into the kitchen and came back out, "we have ice cream to celebrate!" The kids squealed and most of the adults gasped. They hadn't had ice cream in over a year at this point. "Complements of a little judicious theft from a certain number of highly placed individuals," he said.

"And we have cake too," Harmony called as she led the Maxwell girls out of the kitchen. Cake wasn't hard to make from scratch as long as you had the basic ingredients. Most of those ingredients, such as eggs and flour, the Visitors were making sure that there was enough for all and so they hadn't had trouble getting them. The harder to find ingredients, such as powdered sugar for the icing, had been 'claimed' for the resistance by Elias at the same time as the ice cream. Everyone settled down to celebrate although the sorrow of Ruby's death hadn't yet been overcome. That would take time they knew by now and they also knew that Ruby would want them to celebrate Julie's return and the rescue of thirty political prisoners.

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Martin spent the next week holed up in his quarters with his leg up, reading. In a gesture of apology for his injury, (which Martin found very amusing because he was the one who had helped to plan the raid!) Steven had assigned his personal assistant Barbara to Martin. Barbara was to take over Martin's normal duties as well as to run any errands that Martin needed done personally. Martin was just grateful that it was Barbara who was the one Steven had chosen. She was his second for the Fifth Column and knew what to ignore when it came to Martin's duties. She also could run his messages to the rest of the Fifth Column and go planet side for him to get him more reading material.

He had to explain to her just why he wanted books on Human pregnancy but as she already knew about Robin, he wasn't that upset about telling her. She in turn was shocked that he and his wife were expecting a child. When she got done cursing Diana in an unexpected demonstration of just how well she had learned English swearing, she had agreed to get Martin the books he wanted.

Martin had already read about the basics of Human pregnancy but the last time he was in the bookstore he had seen a book for expecting fathers. He hadn't been able to get it that time, being too busy, but he had nothing to do for the next week. So he wanted to study up on what he was missing. From what he knew of his own species gestation, he thought it was both a good and a bad thing that he was stuck up here on the mother ship while Robin was with the resistance. On the one hand, he didn't have to deal with all of the difficulties associated with pregnancy. Dealing with a pregnant Visitor female was bad enough. Who knew what a Human female pregnant with a Visitor child would be going through? On the other hand, he was missing out on the wonder of his child growing and being born. And while he had other children, they had all been conceived at the Leader's orders. He had nothing to do with them after their conception. If he survived leading the Fifth Column, this time would be different. This time he was going to be a father.


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

It was Lorraine, one of his Fifth Columnists, who informed Martin of the message from the homeworld. Civil War had broken out between a few of the Houses and the Governing Council. John, the Supreme Commander, had forbidden anyone who had seen the message to talk about it to anyone one. While those serving in the military were supposed to serve only the Leader as head of the Governing Council, many were still extremely loyal to their own Houses. John was concerned that many would chose to revolt against the Leader and go to work for the Fifth Column. He already had a war to fight on one front; he couldn't afford to open up another one with his own people.

Of course, John and the rest of the Visitor Fleet Commanders were doing just that but they didn't want to admit that more than a few of their people were siding with the enemy, preferring to believe that only a few people had decided to turn traitor. To them the fact that the enemy wasn't even another reptile species, but a mammalian one simply made the matter even more incomprehensible to them. To them mammals were food, plain and simple. It didn't matter if the mammals in question were an intelligent species or not. Martin knew that as long as there was a food shortage on the homeworld many would look the other way in the name of keeping their families and Houses fed. But just as many members of the fleet were either on the fence or actively taking part in thwarting the Leader's plans for Earth. John and his people had far fewer loyal soldiers than they knew.

Unfortunately it also didn't mean that Martin had more soldiers than they did. While most Visitors weren't fanatically loyal to the Leader, the famine back home did put them in a hard position. Taking sides on what most viewed as a purely philosophical discussion wasn't seen as very realistic approach to the hard question of how were they to feed their own people. It was a simple truth that most people, Visitor or Human, would ransom everything they had, even their own souls, if it meant that their children wouldn't starve to death. But that didn't mean that the Fifth Column wasn't growing daily either and once news of a civil war against the Leader circulated the fleet even more would join.

After Lorraine had told him about the civil war at home, Martin contacted Jennifer, the Fifth Column leader on the New York mother ship and a member of his House. He knew that one of her duties as the second in command of that ship was to shuffle personnel assignments. If she could get enough Fifth Columnists assigned to her ship, then they could take it over. His House back home would benefit greatly from having a mother ship at their disposal. He could only hope that it and the supplies it carried would make up for the fact that he would never return to his home.

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It was the practical joker aspect of her husband that Robin was getting to know through his letters that would have appreciated Ham Tyler's way of letting the resistance know that he had a way to simulate the sound of a Visitor's voice. Standing out side the resistance headquarters and yelling like he was a Visitor before walking in and taking the device off would have had Martin cracking up. Robin personally thought it was a good way for Tyler to get himself shot. But the devices did help them to impersonate the Visitors' voices so that they could recon their targets better. The alien reverberation that echoed through their words was something that both Humans and Visitors had come to take for granted. Anyone who sounded like a Visitor must be a Visitor and that sort of thinking was something they could now take advantage of.

Of course not all raids were against Visitor targets. The resistance also had to get supplies and the Visitors couldn't provide them with everything they needed. So they made sure that the Human targets they raided were those like Mike's mother, those who supported the Visitors. On one such raid something caught Robert's eye. He had been looking for a way to apologize to Robin and hopefully reconcile with her but she hadn't made it easy. She still refused to talk to him unless it was absolutely necessary. Maybe she would accept this olive branch.

Later that night after all of the kids had been sent to bed; Robert approached Robin with a bag in his hand. She was sitting in the dining hall with Ham Tyler. They were eating something with their fingers off of a plate that he couldn't see. "What are you eating?" he asked before he could stop himself.

Robin wouldn't even look at him. Tyler did and calmly said, "Locusts dipped in honey and fried."

Robert shuddered. He knew that it wasn't something that would hurt Robin to eat. People had been eating locusts for centuries and still did in certain parts of the world. It just wasn't something that you would normally see in modern America. But then Ham Tyler traveled in primitive parts of the world where frequently bugs were the only source of food. And Robin was carrying a Visitor child, so it wasn't that strange that they would be eating something like that; or so Robert told himself. He truly had no wish to find out what other pregnancy cravings his daughter was experiencing. What little information he had was more than his stomach could handle.

He placed the bag on the table in front of her. "I saw this on the raid and thought you could use it." He waited while Robin decided if she was going to take it or not. Slowly she reached up and took the diaper bag and her hand shook a little as she lifted it off the table when she realized that it wasn't empty. Robin shot him an assessing look and set it back down the bare inch that she'd lifted it off the table. She pulled it over to her and opened it up.

Inside was a stack of cloth diapers with plastic pants, a baby outfit that could work for either a boy or a girl, a set of bottles with a couple of cans of formula, and on the bottom everything she would need to knit a baby blanket in a colorful, soft yarn. She looked at him at once both hopeful and wary. "I'm not going to hurt the baby Robin," he sighed. "I just didn't want you to have to deal with the problems that are likely to happen. The most likely outcome of this kind of hybridism isn't going to be pretty. There are so many things that can and are very likely to go wrong. But I'll help you in any way that I can."

"I thought you wanted my baby dead because it's half Visitor," Robin said, still wary.

"No honey, I just know how much can go wrong and that's when we're talking about a fully Human pregnancy. When you add in the complication of trying to meld two such very different physiologies, the complications can be staggering. I don't want your baby to die but the simple truth of the matter is that the likelihood of your baby being able to survive on its own isn't good. If the child lives, well there will be problems. I just don't want you to have to deal with them. It's not the baby I want to kill. The father on the other hand, I want to tear into small pieces with my bare hands."

'Good luck with that,' Tyler thought to himself. There was no way that Robert Maxwell, who although he was a good resistance member was not a professional soldier, would be able to take Martin down. Martin would clean Robert's clock; after all, the alien had already cleaned his.

"I don't want you to do that," Robin protested. "I don't want to have three kids to raise." Her words were rather pointed and Tyler was impressed. She had completely bypassed the entire consent issue and had gone for an entirely different and yet very important issue; the fact that Martin would take Robert out if he tried anything. Not that Tyler thought Martin wanted to kill his father in law but self defense was self defense. And if it came down to that, Robert was a dead man.

Robert nodded. It was a small price to pay to get his daughter back. "Can I at least reserve the right to hate his guts for the rest of my life?" he asked with a smile. Robin shrugged carelessly. That wasn't something that her father was ever going to stop doing, even after he found out what had really happened. She knew that asking him to accept her new life was going to have to be done in small steps and that acceptance was all that she was ever likely to get. First she had to get him to accept the baby, and then she could work on getting him to accept her husband. But she wasn't stupid enough to think that the fact that Martin hadn't had any more choice than she did in the matter was going to help.

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Thanks to Tyler's little device and the uniforms they had gotten from Martin, the resistance was able to find out what Commander Pamela's ship was doing hovering over LA. The Visitors weren't even trying to hide the fact that they were stealing water any longer. Huge pumps were working overtime to channel water up to the second mother ship from the local reservoir. It had to be stopped.

That raid was a success, although they had lost yet another member of their unit. Mark, one of their two ex-cops, had broken his leg on the way out from planting the explosives in the pumping station. Rather than have anyone try to carry him out, he decided to stay behind and die, guarding the rear. There was a very simple and stark reason for this suicidal decision. They had only a few minutes to get out before a laser beam security system ran through their only means of escape. Anyone caught in the beams would be instantly incinerated. Mark knew he couldn't make it and that carrying him would only slow anyone else down enough to cost them their lives. Mark refused to do that and so he died. They knew he wasn't going to be the last person to die. All they could do was mourn him and continue on with the fight.


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 12

A/N: There are two different POV's being shown in this chapter that are taking place at the exact same time. Because this timing is important, short little blurbs from each POV will show what is happening.

The second, or maybe third most thing that Martin had never wanted to happen, had. Diana had found out about Sean Donovan and was about to use him against his father. He didn't have time to warn Mike about Diana's plot before she had sent the message out. She had Mike's son and wanted him in exchange. The worst part was that there was absolutely no way that he could get Mike out of Diana's clutches now. The only thing he could do was to give Mike the option of suicide, should he be willing to take it when they finally brought him up to the mother ship.

Knowing that there was a good chance that either Mike wouldn't take that option or that he wouldn't be able to before security found out about it, Martin packed up the things that he wanted to keep and sent them with Lorraine down to a small apartment that he had secured in LA. If Diana did manage to get his name out of Mike, then there would be nothing in his quarters for her to find. Then he sent a note to Jennifer in New York, along with a last message for his family. He had known for some time that he would not be returning to his homeworld. Either Diana would find out about him and he would die or he would go to the resistance on his own. With either option he would no longer be able to contact his family. They would need to hear from him before that happened. If he was lucky, then he would be able to get out. If he wasn't, then Lorraine would be able to get his stuff to Robin.

Martin wasn't able to be there when the exchange was made but that was alright. He was busy setting things up so that if he was killed, Barbara would be able to take over without any disruption. All too soon it became apparent that his suicide tactic had failed. The Fifth Columnist that had taken the poison to Mike was killed and Mike was brought in to one of Diana's torture chambers. Martin was at her side, playing the loyal lieutenant for as long as he could. But Diana didn't choose torture, which Mike might have withstood long enough to die. Instead, she chose to use a truth serum. Mike couldn't withstand Diana's concoction and soon gave up Martin's name as his Fifth Column contact. Martin managed to shoot the guard, killing him instantly. Diana used the distraction to get away, but not before Martin shot her in the shoulder. He dragged Mike out of the chair and into the ventilation shafts.

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Far away, the resistance had moved their headquarters into an abandoned prison. As Julie, Harmony and Robin began to set up the new infirmary, Robin went into labor. After only a few hours of little to no progression, Julie realized that Robin was going to need a C-section. Harmony, Willie and Robert did their best to help but Robert and Willie were unable to do much of anything other than hold Robin's hands while Julie and Harmony prepared her for the delivery.

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In the ventilation shafts, Mike was apologizing for not being able to keep his mouth shut. Martin shrugged it off and told Mike that it had only been a matter of time before he had been discovered. The shafts that they were in were as large as the New York subway system but they couldn't stay still for long. If they stayed in one place they would be found. They continued to move until for some reason that Mike couldn't see, Martin fell to his knees, a strange cry issuing from his throat.

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At the prison, Julie delivered a baby girl who appeared to be a normal Human, at least until she opened her mouth to cry at her birth. Her tongue was a reptile's. Robin was unaffected by the sight, being more concerned that her daughter was healthy than what she might have inherited from her father. Julie, however, wasn't as matter of fact and nearly dropped the baby. Harmony grabbed the little girl before she could be dropped and Julie took a step back to regain her composure.

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This was something that had never happened to Martin before. He had lived his entire life 'hearing' his brother within his heart and mind. But he had never 'heard' anyone else before. The cry that had driven him to his knees was new and to his shock there was now someone else in the link. Before he could adjust to that new information another cry dropped him to the floor of the shaft.

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As Julie stepped back, something began moving in the incision in Robin's belly. To the shock of everyone in the surgical room, another baby began to crawl out of Robin. This child too cried at the change of environment. This child was more Visitor than Human, although like his sister, he too had traits that showed his mixed heritage. His eyes were blue and Human and his cry, while it was more of a hiss than a Human child's cry, did not reverberate as a Visitor's did. But his most prominent feature was his skin, which although it was as green as his father's, had no scales whatsoever.

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Mike was at his friend's side instantly, rolling Martin onto his back. Martin lay there gasping while Mike tried to figure out what was wrong. Martin waved him off, batting at the hands that were frantically searching for a wound. "I'm ok," he finally managed to gasp out.

"Bullshit!" Donovan growled.

Martin knew that there was no way he was going to get out of explaining this one. "Mike, I haven't been able to tell you too much about me in the time we've known each other," he said as he climbed swiftly to his feet. He gave his Human friend a gentle push in the direction they had been traveling. He did have a destination in mind. If they could get there in time, they just might get out of this situation alive. "Human pregnancies that produce twins are about 1 in 1,000 or so if the information that I have is correct. Visitor pregnancies that result in twins are more like 1 in 500,000 and those that produce living children even more rare. Twins are the result of a single zygote rather than two are only show up 1 in every 1,500,000. My brother and I are the result of one such pregnancy."

"The English term is identical twins," Mike supplied, wondering where Martin was going with this story. And what did the fact that Martin and his brother were twins have to do with what put Martin on the floor? "Fraternal twins are the result of two zygotes."

Martin nodded and continued. "There is no literature, medical or otherwise, that tells about the link between identical twins. My brother and I can feel each other's pain and emotions. We've never been able to 'hear' anyone else. But there has never been a case where one twin has become a parent to another set of twins," Martin paused, "not until now. Robin has just given birth to two children, my children. I can 'hear' them the same way I can 'hear' my brother."

"And that put you on the floor?" Mike demanded.

"Well I wasn't exactly expecting to 'hear' anyone other than my brother. And I certainly wasn't ready to 'hear' them cry at the top of their mental voices either!" Martin snapped.

Mike had the grace to look abashed. He was a father. He knew that babies cried when they were born. It was one of the ways that you knew the baby was ok. "Where are we headed?" he asked, changing the subject.

"Here," Martin said as they reached the spot he had been headed for.

"Where's here?" Mike asked confused.

"This is where we get off," Martin said.

"Great, in what?" Mike asked.

"In these," Martin said and passed Mike a parachute.

"Are you joking? We're going to sky dive outa here?" Mike asked incredulous.

"That's right," Martin confirmed with a slight grin.

"Do you realize how many miles up we are?"

"As a matter of fact I do," Martin said calmly. He was enjoying this. He had never seen his friend so freaked out before.

"I got a better idea. Let's work our way back to the landing bay, steal a fighter and cruise home," Mike said as he put the pack aside to go back the way they had come.

"Get back here and put that on," Martin ordered. They put the parachutes on and Martin continued, "You know I don't know why you're making such a fuss about this Donovan. In our service young cadets are required to do this in their very first weeks of training."

"All right, all right," Mike said, not wanting to hear it. "What do I do?"

"Just lower yourself over the edge. Force of air in the chute will take care of the rest. Now go!"

"Wait, cadets really do this?" Mike asked.

"No," Martin said from behind him. "Sounded good though," he said as he shoved Mike over the edge with his boot.

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Once on the ground Mike had to lead Martin to a safe place. Martin hadn't had time to grab his sunglasses and the light was far too bright for him to see. "Crap," he cussed as he was led blindly to the closest building to their landing spot. "This is the only thing I don't like about your planet. Damned sun is too bright," he muttered to himself. It wasn't something that the Visitors had advertised, seeing it as a weakness that could be exploited, but they had evolved as nocturnal predators on their homeworld. While they had no difficulty moving around in the daytime on either planet, the bright light of the Sol star was more than their eyes could handle without pain. Martin was walking around with one arm thrown over his eyes and the other hand latched tightly onto Donovan.

"Here we go," Mike said as he guided Martin inside. The building was blissfully dark to Martin's eyes. "We can stay here until dark. Then we have to figure out where to go from here." He didn't know where the new headquarters was, nor did he know anyone who did. They would have to go through a complicated chain of contacts before they could find that information.

"West, we need to go west," Martin muttered. He was exhausted. He really hadn't expected to survive and he didn't have the strength to explain that he could 'feel' where the babies were.

Mike lowered Martin to the floor and to his astonishment; the Visitor just curled up on the floor and went to sleep. "Guess you must be tired," he said softly. Well, Martin had saved his life. The least he could do would be to watch over him while he slept, even if Martin had tricked him in order to do it.


	13. Chapter 13

Chapter 13

As soon as the sun set, Mike went out and found a van. After stealing it (Elias' lessons in boosting cars came in handy sometimes) he picked up Martin from where he was hiding. "Head west," Martin instructed from where he was sitting on the floor. They couldn't take the chance that he would be seen. His uniform was too distinctive and there would only be one couple of men fitting their description running around LA right now.

"Are you sure?" Mike asked.

"They're fussing. Whatever it is that your people are doing, my children don't like it." Martin didn't add that they were giving him a headache. It wasn't pertinent to their discussion and he was used to keeping such things to himself. He did wonder if his brother had heard the children too. It wasn't likely. He couldn't hear his brother unless he was in a certain amount of pain because they were so far away from each other.

"Babies always fuss," Mike reassured him. "It isn't like they can tell their caregivers any other way that they don't like what is happening to them."

"I understand but it does mean that I know where they are," Martin said. "Turn left here." With Martin giving the directions, it wasn't long before they found the new headquarters. Once there, Mike drove right up to the gate and was let in, although the people on guard duty were taking no chances, not after the security tape they had seen.

"Hey guys! Didja miss me?" Mike asked as he got out of the van. His Human voice relaxed the sentries, although Elias did come up to him with a switch blade.

"Sorry man, but we can't take the chance you know?" he said as he made a small cut on the back of Mike's hand. Visitor blood was green, while Human was red. That was the only concern they had. Mike hadn't been in Visitor custody long enough to be converted.

"I know but my guest can't pass that test," Mike grinned as he took his hand back. "Martin had to come along this time." He went over and opened the van's side door. Martin got out immediately.

"Good to meet ya. Now how did you two find this place?" Elias wanted to know.

"They're very loud and I can't take it any longer," Martin snapped and started running towards the building. Elias and Mike followed while the rest of the sentries stayed at their post. They would find things out later.

"What's he talking about?" Elias wanted to know. He wasn't really happy when he noticed that Martin wasn't pausing for more than a second and that was more to get around people than to figure out which way he was going.

"Robin had twins, right?" Mike asked.

"How the hell did you know that?" Tyler snapped as he joined them in running after Martin.

By then they had reached the prison infirmary. Harmony was pacing outside in the hallway with the little baby girl. Martin ran up to her and took the bundled baby out of her arms. "You're not doing this right," he said as he took the baby back inside. Inside Willie too, was walking with a baby. "Give that one to me," Martin ordered. When Willie saw that no one was waving a gun around at Martin or anything of that nature, he complied. "Now where is their mother?" he demanded.

"She needs her rest and so do they," Julie said firmly. By this time half the resistance was following and wondering just what was going on.

Martin sighed. "You don't know how to deal with Visitor twins and these two are driving me nuts. Now where is she?" He was holding the twins carefully together against his chest while trying to unwrap them. 'Why in the world would they tie these children up with blankets like this? They couldn't move an inch!'

Confused, and hoping that Martin would soon make sense, Julie gestured to the recovery room where Robin was hopefully asleep. Martin walked in, not wanting to scare anyone while he had the children in his arms. "Robin?"

Robin hadn't been sleeping. The medication Julie had given her had worn off and she was too uncomfortable to sleep. She wasn't about to ask for more though. She knew exactly how much they had in the way of painkillers and she wasn't going to use something that would be needed by the fighters if she could help it. She looked up as Martin walked through the door, carrying the twins. "Martin? What are you doing here?" she asked.

Martin winked at her while he had his back to everyone else. They poured into the room behind him. "You had these two while I was getting Donovan off the mother ship. They put me on my knees when they were born and they've been crying ever since. They need to have skin contact with you, now," he insisted. Very carefully between the two of them they managed to get the babies unwrapped from their blankets and under the covers on Robin's naked chest. "They need to hear your heartbeat and they need physical contact with you and each other. Twins don't like to be apart."

"How is it that you know all of this when Willie didn't?" Julie asked. "And what do you mean they've been crying? They haven't made a sound." Nothing that Martin was doing was harmful in any way to any of her patients so she was willing to go along with him for now. And the children did seem to be settling down. No one had been able to get them to go to sleep.

"Visitor twins are rare, extremely so in some cases," Martin explained. "I am a twin, so I know more about them than other Visitors. And yes, they have been crying; very loudly I might add. Visitor twins have a mental link between them. I've been hearing them up here," he tapped the side of his head. "I've never been able to hear anyone other than my brother before. That's how Mike and I found your new headquarters. I just followed the children's crying."

"Just how rare are twins?" Tyler demanded. If Martin could 'hear' the twins mentally, then maybe someone else could too.

"Twins that hatch alive are about 1 in a 1,000,000. My brother and I are currently the only set of adult twins serving in the fleet and my brother Philip is on leave back on our homeworld." Martin sagged back against the wall next to the bed where Robin was holding their children. Kkkeesk/Philip was serving in the fleet's Inspector General's Office. Well, he had been at least until their father had declared war on the Leader. "Do they have names?" he asked Robin.

"The little girl is Elizabeth," Robin said nodding at the Human twin. "And the little boy is William," she said, nodding at the Visitor twin. "He's named after Willie." She waved a single finger at the only other Visitor in the room. Willie looked shocked at this revelation. "He really helped me through the last stages of my pregnancy. I went into convulsions once and he knew just what to do to take care of them." She had thanked Willie before for his help but she hadn't shared in her plans to name her child after him if it was a boy. She decided that since all of her family was in the same room together, she might as well take the next small step in getting them used to each other. "How's your arm?"

Martin startled. He hadn't even thought about his arm in months. "It's fine. I'm still not used to seeing your skin there though."

"That's probably because you have to wear those gloves all the time. I don't cover mine up, so I'm used to seeing your skin there now," Robin said matter of factly. "Now just how long am I going to have to keep this up? Because I may be on bed rest now, but I still have to get up and take care of some things." Martin instructed her on the care of twins while the resistance looked on.

Robert wasn't the only one who was startled at the information of just who had supplied the skin for the skin graft on Robin's arm. The fact that her skin had been grafted onto his arm came as a bit of a shock. No one had thought to ask where her own skin had gone. Robert was also a little surprised to realize that Robin was treating Martin like an old friend. 'It makes sense I suppose. She did spend time with him on the mother ship and he did rescue her.'

Julie was listening intently to the instructions that Martin was giving Robin. She was also putting two and two together and coming up with more than just 'a mental connection between twins'. If Martin was Elizabeth and William's father as well as a twin, then that made a lot more sense that he could 'hear' them than if there was no real connection between them. It also made sense that Robin was still refusing to name her children's father. She was protecting Martin. She would have to figure someway to send him away from the resistance headquarters. There was no way that any of them were ready for that particular confrontation.

Willie had known what the Battle Bride mark was and hadn't said anything to anyone about it. He was glad for Robin's sake that the Visitor she had been married to wasn't one of Diana's people. That group was scary. He was also very much aware of just who Martin was. Although he was only a technician in the fleet, his family wasn't that far removed from Martin's own in their own culture's class structure. He was a few years younger than the twins and his parent's had made certain that he knew everyone who needed to be known, both above and below his own station. He had been fascinated by the twins; as much for the fact that they had been developed from the same zygote as anything else. But the revelation that Martin was one of the twins also gave him a new respect for Ham Tyler. The man had actually survived being beaten. The twins were masters of the Visitor's martial arts and few could match them.


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter 14

Martin was discussing the situation with Willie as they fed his son the next morning. Robin and Harmony were on the bed feeding Elizabeth while they sat in chairs next to the bed feeding William. They were speaking in their own language. Willie had been the one to make sure of that, explaining that his English was terrible and he could barely make himself understood.

'I was supposed to go to the Middle East,' Willie said. It was a pleasure to finally be able to communicate without worrying about making himself understood. 'I learned Arabic but at the last minute my assignment was switched to here. Harmony says they "screwed" me. I have to agree although the mix up did have its own benefits. I suppose that somewhere in this city someone speaks that language but I haven't met anyone yet.'

Martin shook his head. 'English was hard enough for me to learn. I can't imagine learning two Human languages, much less learning one while tracking it.'

Willie agreed. 'It has been difficult. Sometimes I do not think that I will ever master it. I keep getting things mixed up. I'm just glad that Harmony can usually figure out what I mean.'

'You like her don't you?' Martin said. He had wondered why those two seemed to be together most of the time. They had even watched the doorway for him so that he could see Robin alone last night. He hadn't been able to stay long. Robin had been tired and he hadn't wanted anyone to know he was there with her. He had met Robert and apparently things were getting better between the two of them now that the twins were born. He didn't want to disrupt that.

Willie ducked his head and if Martin could have seen his real face he would have sworn the other Visitor's crest was bright green. 'She is kind and gentle,' Willie muttered, focusing on the plate that held a butchered rabbit. To help out the resistance the children were raising rabbits for meat on grass and weeds. 'She doesn't mind my appearance nor does she hold the Leader's plans against me."

'She's a rare woman,' Martin agreed. 'At least you're going about courting her in the proper fashion. Robin had me chained to her before she knew what was happening.'

'I do not understand why it was done. I mean, the only one that I can think of who is unstable enough to do it in the first place is Diana. I was glad to find out that the poor girl wasn't given to one of her people but why would she want to do it in the first place?' It was something that had bewildered Willie for months now.

Martin smirked, 'I wouldn't sleep with her and I had a good enough excuse that managed to put her off for two years. Thank you for looking after Robin for me. I didn't think that Diana would make these two possible. When I sent Robin back to the resistance I had no idea that she was carrying my children.'

'Her neck was marked when I first met her,' Willie protested. In fact, Robin's neck still bore the strange blue/green mark all the way around, although it was beginning to fade at last.

'Humans don't have such a sign. In fact, in very rare cases I've heard that a female can even not know that she's pregnant until she gives birth!' That fact was astonishing to Martin, who was used to females whose neck showed the mark of pregnancy within hours after conception.

Robin shifted Elizabeth to her shoulder to burp her and noticed that Willie was staring at Martin in shock. "I wonder what that's all about?" she asked Harmony, nodding at their men.

"Oh I'm sure they'll let us know eventually," Harmony said as she raised her voice as a prod at the two.

The two men grinned sheepishly over at their ladies and changed the subject. 'I don't want to put Robin or the children in a bad position. Robin and her father seem to be reconciling. I knew that they were at odds with each other. She said that she wasn't talking to him. But it seems to me that it is too soon to add me into the mix. Does he still hate our people mindlessly?' Martin asked. William was done with his rabbit now and wanted to play. He wondered how parents who couldn't tell coped with their children.

'Not now, but he did. He is getting better at realizing that not all of us follow the Leader and his evil willingly or blindly. But still you are correct; it is too soon for him to learn that his eldest daughter is your Battle Bride.' was Willie's analysis of the situation.

Martin nodded and sighed. 'I'll have to leave today.' He didn't want to leave but the facts of the matter spoke for themselves. If he didn't show up within 48 hours at his apartment then Barbara would take over the Fifth Column thinking that he was dead. He just couldn't do that to his second and friend.

Willie pulled out his glasses and handed them to Martin. When Martin took them looking surprised, he shrugged. 'They don't let me out much around here,' he said depreciatively. It wasn't like they didn't have good reason to keep him restricted. Willie had never been a Fifth Columnist. He had been captured by Elias and his father when he was on a date with Harmony. Although by now the resistance members all knew that Willie was actually quite happy with the situation, everyone knew it was far better to keep Willie under wraps.

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Elizabeth Maxwell was seven days old the first time she showed just how different she was from other children. It wasn't the Visitor's tongue or venom pouches that showed so obviously. It was the fact that she had shed her skin and was now the size of a Human two year old. According to Willie, Visitor children didn't shed their skin until they were six years old and at that time the changes were not so obvious. As far as Julie could tell, she was perfectly fine. The same could not be said about her brother.

It didn't take long to for everyone who was involved in his care to realize that there was something wrong with little William. William for some reason was getting weaker and weaker. They had done all that they could do to build his strength, even going so far as to get him animals from the Visitors homeworld to eat. But nothing that Julie or Willie could come up with helped the little boy. When he was seven days old William Maxwell, son of Robin Maxwell and the Visitor known as Martin, died.

At the moment he died, Elizabeth screamed for only the second time in her short life. Her mother and the others did their best to console her but there was nothing that anyone could do. Her twin was gone and nothing could bring him back. On the other side of the city, Martin once more fell to his knees, this time from both the wrench of his son's death and from his daughter's scream. After a moment of shock and dismay he 'reached' out to Elizabeth to soothe her fright. There was nothing else that he could do.

"Sir?" Lorraine asked as she helped Martin up off the floor.

"I'm alright," he said as he sat down behind the cheep desk. The apartment wasn't much more than a single room hole in the wall, one of the places that barely qualified as habitable by Human standards. But all Martin had to pay was the rent and that had been paid with money taken from the personal belongings from those packed away on the mother ship. He had all the food he could eat in the form of the rats that lived in the building and he needed nothing else. All of his time was spent directing the Fifth Column and doing what he could to end this stupid war. "I'm alright Lorraine," he repeated. "Now are you sure that Josh is right about the members of his squad?" While half of his attention was on what he was doing, the rest was taken up with Elizabeth. He couldn't imagine what she was going through. And even worse, all he could do was mentally hold her hand.

Lorraine eyed her superior officer suspiciously. He still wore his uniform and most of the body suit that made him appear Human. He looked a little shaken but alright. She glanced at his naked arms and hands. His color was good as far as she could see.

Martin had removed that portion of his body suit for a simple reason. More and more of the recruits for the Fifth Column were because of the war back home than because what they were doing to the Humans was wrong. Martin had a choice. He could either use the fact that Robin was his Battle Bride, thus winning more support for his cause, or he could hide it. He had no desire to hide it. He wasn't ashamed of Robin anymore than she was of him. The only reason that she hadn't told anyone was to protect him from her father. And she had told him outright that she was trying to ease her father into the knowledge. She had gotten a promise from him that he wouldn't try to kill Martin out of hand. Personally that was more than he had expected the Human to ever agree to.

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Robert had called Julie and Robin into the lab. "Did you find out what killed William?" Robin asked quietly. If it hadn't been for Elizabeth, she'd have been devastated by the loss of her son. As it was, she concentrated on Elizabeth and doing her best to learn how to shoot. She fully intended to go with Mike when he went to meet Martin again. It was the only way she had to learn what was going on in Elizabeth's mind. She had to know that to be able to help her daughter. She hadn't been able to train or take part in the raids before because she was pregnant but she was determined that she would not be helpless. Not like she was when she was captured. She wasn't going to let that happen again.

"Yes and Robin, it wasn't because of something going wrong with his body. His blood was swarming with bacteria. He died of an infection. I checked Elizabeth and she has the same bacteria in her but she seems to be immune. Here take a look," Robert gestured to Julie. Julie looked into the microscope. Robert led her through the sample of William's blood, one of Willie's and a normal sample from a Human. The bacteria seemed to be a hybrid of two normal bacteria that lived in the intestinal tracts of Humans and Visitors.

It was Robin who asked the important question. "Elizabeth is more Human than Visitor. William was more Visitor than Human. Does that mean that this bacteria will kill Visitors but not Humans?"

"Maybe," Robert nodded cautiously.

"We need to run more tests," Julie told them both, but her eyes were gleaming.


	15. Chapter 15

Chapter 15

Robert Maxwell stood sentry duty at the top of the water tower that was the highest point in the resistance camp and pondered his daughter's situation. He wasn't a stupid man. He knew that there was something more going on between Robin and Martin than was obvious. He just hoped that it wasn't a matter of stepping from one bad relationship right into another. Brian had hurt her terribly. Hell, the creep had raped his little girl! But while it was universally agreed that he was Diana's lapdog, Martin wasn't. And from everything Robert had learned about the Fifth Column leader, he was a decent person. He also had that link or whatever with Elizabeth. He couldn't deny that his daughter was going to need help raising the little girl. He just wasn't sure that getting involved with another Visitor male was the right way to go about doing it.

On the other hand, if Martin hadn't been flirting back with Robin, then he was a...well nothing came to mind at the moment but he was pretty sure he wasn't a whatever it was. He'd have to have a talk with Mike later, have him take a message to Martin and let him know that what he was doing was flirting. It wouldn't be a good idea to assume that the alien had known what interpretation the Humans would put on his actions. He did know for sure that Robin had been flirting. Robert sighed a little. Robin's flirting was nothing like what she had done in front of him before. Before Brian had gotten a hold of her, Robin's flirting had gone all out. Oh she had thought she was subtle, but she wasn't, not at all. Which was typical of a teenager and he had been prepared for. He hadn't been a teacher for nothing. Now she was much more subdued. 'Five minutes alone with the creep, that's all I ask for,' he thought.

Robert wasn't the only one who wanted a little time alone with someone other than for the sake of privacy and romance. Ham Tyler was sitting in the lab, looking at the little vials of red colored bacteria that the scientists had cultured. If he played this right, he would be able to get his revenge on Daniel Bernstein. He'd already made his first move by playing to 'Gooder's' and his girlfriend's idea that he was a heartless bastard by suggesting they use Willie for the test. Now in reality, he rather liked the scrappy little lizard. That mixed up English thing he had going for him was funny as hell at times and he was sticking by his lady which was something that Tyler could respect. But this way, with a little judicious prodding, he could get this group to go after Brian, the dear friend of Daniel Bernstein. And if they did that, then he could get his hands on Daniel. If anyone had walked into the room right then they would have left as fast as they could at the sight of the smile on the Fixer's face.

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Robin stood guard while Martin and Mike met to talk business. But once that was over she joined the men so that she could talk to her husband about their daughter. "She's the size of a two year old?" Martin asked in amazement. Perhaps that would explain why her thoughts were expanding so rapidly.

"She has been since the day William died," Robin said softly. They could both see the pain in the other's face at the mention of their son.

Martin pulled her into a hug. "Her mind is growing as rapidly as her body. She's searching for William. She can't find him of course, but she is finding other minds. I don't know how else to explain it. She's picking up concepts whole and storing them in her memory but she's not really paying any attention to those concepts. She's too busy looking for William."

Mike interrupted, more to get their minds off the subject of William than anything else. "Robert wanted me to tell you something Martin."

"What?" he asked. While he had met Robert before, they really hadn't interacted all that much. Martin was a little wary of blundering where Robin's family was concerned.

Mike grinned; this was a little ironic under the circumstances. "He wanted to know if you knew that you were flirting with Robin."

Robin grinned right back. "Of course he does, Mike. We did that on purpose. We're easing him into the idea that Martin and I are together. By now he should have gotten the message that I like Martin and Martin likes me. Maybe by the time Elizabeth graduates we can tell him we're married without him going ballistic." She was being sarcastic about her time estimate. She really hoped that it wouldn't take nearly so long.

"Well I'm glad that you're trying to get him used to the idea. The last thing we need is for Robert to try and kill Martin right now." Mike wasn't kidding. A personal vendetta between one of the main members of the resistance and the leader of their only allies was the worst thing that could happen.

"We know Mike," Martin said as reached up to scratch his neck. It took a second for him to realize the significance of his actions. "You two had better get back right now," he insisted and he gave Robin a gentle shove in Mike's direction. "Elizabeth's starting to shed again and who knows what'll happen this time if you're not there?"

Robin's eyes opened wide and then she bolted for the truck. If Elizabeth grew any more then she would be walking, or at least the size to be walking, and climbing and who knew what else? Mike followed her, knowing from his own experience as a father that children who were unsupervised often got into trouble, especially if no one knew they were capable of it.

"Zon I hate shedding," Martin muttered to himself as he left for his apartment. It was always worse when it wasn't he wasn't the one that was going through it.

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Elizabeth was pleased that the itchy stuff was gone. She looked around at her crib and saw that it wasn't so far to the ground now. She carefully climbed down and started to wander the halls of the prison turned resistance headquarters. She was looking for something, although she wasn't quite sure just what it was. There was something missing. The missing hurt and she wanted to find whatever was missing so that the hurt would stop. Maybe it was Mommy that was missing?

She peered into one of the rooms she was passing. No Mommy. There was a man person and he was cleaning a gun. The knowledge of just what kind of gun it was, how to clean it, why it needed to be cleaned and just what Ham Tyler was planning on using it for settled into the back of Elizabeth's mind but she paid no attention. She had to find the missing thing.

The next room she peered into had a little girl in it. She was holding something. 'Was that the missing thing?' Elizabeth wondered. Elizabeth went into the room and Katie, who had been sitting on a cell bunk playing with her only doll, went over to greet the new little girl. Elizabeth, not knowing any of the etiquette for small children and toys, reached for the doll. Katie wasn't about to have anyone take her only doll without asking and pushed Elizabeth. Elizabeth, who hadn't been walking for more than an hour at most, fell down. Surprised and hurt she reacted instinctively.

Fortunately Robin got there in time to put her hand in front of Elizabeth's mouth, blocking the venom spray. "Elizabeth no," Robin hissed.

Robert picked up Katie and swatted her on the backside. "Katie, you know better than to push down kids that are smaller than you are!" he said sternly.

"She was going to take my dolly!" Katie cried.

"She's never seen a dolly Katie," Robin said breathlessly. The pain in her hand was terrible. "She just wanted to see what it was."

"Oh," Katie said. She looked at her big sister and noticed that she was holding her hand like it hurt. "Did you get a boo boo?" she asked. Robin nodded. That was probably the best way to explain what had happened. "Daddy can you kiss it better?" Katie asked innocently.

Elizabeth had been absorbing the information flying around her effortlessly. When she realized that she had hurt her mother, her expression turned stricken and she pulled her mother's hand down. "It'll be ok sweetie. I know you didn't mean to hurt me," Robin said. She hugged her daughter. Elizabeth hadn't meant to hurt her mother and she had learned from Katie that a kiss would make the pain go away. So she kissed where Robin had caught her venom. With her head blocking the view, no one saw the small sparkles that accompanied the kiss.

"Very good Elizabeth," Robert praised. "Now what do you say you come with Grandpa and Aunt Katie and we'll find you your own doll?" He scooped up both little girls and carried them off. He would leave Robin in Father Andrew's capable hands.

"Let's get you to the infirmary," Father Andrew said. He hustled Robin in and Julie was there waiting for them. Julie reached for Robin's hand and turned it over. To everyone's surprise, her hand was fine.


	16. Chapter 16

Chapter 16

Ham Tyler was very pleased with the raid on Daniel Bernstein's home. The small party that Maggie had thrown for Daniel meant that the only people in the house that weren't resistance members were Daniel and Brian. And that meant that after Brian was taken outside to the van, he and Maggie were the only ones left in the house with Daniel. "Now you listen up you little punk," he growled into the young man's face. "I want you to know just what's going to happen to you and why. I don't like scum who kill little old ladies. I like them even less when the little old ladies they kill are members of their own family."

With Maggie holding Daniel at gun point there was little that he could do but stand and watch while Tyler picked up the phone. "Is this Visitor Security Headquarters? Never mind who I am. I just saw one of your men captured and I know who set up him. His name is Daniel Bernstein." With that, Tyler hung up the phone. He had not only talked too quickly for Steven to figure out who and where he was, he hadn't given Daniel time to say anything either. He then knocked Daniel out.

"Let's go," he told Maggie who nodded. If there was anyone who understood how much Daniel deserved what Tyler had sentenced him to, it was Maggie. She had taken the job as Daniel's girlfriend as the job it was and had given her heart to another man; a man who had given his life for his fellow resistance members. Losing Mark and Ruby and so many others had her craving vengeance just as much as Tyler. And by turning Daniel over to the Visitors, they made sure that he would get the ultimate punishment. He deserved to be eaten for what he had done.

Back at the resistance headquarters Mike and Tyler were dragging Brian through to the hallways to the lab. Robin saw him as he was dragged past. Brian tried to get her to help him, although Robin couldn't begin to think why he thought she would. She wasn't any happier with him now than she was before. Even if he thought that because she was Martin's wife she would help him it didn't make sense. He had to know that Martin was on their side by now. Robin walked back into the room where she was currently living with Elizabeth and her sisters. She had to read Elizabeth and Katie their bedtime story and after that she could turn to planning what she would do now that Brian was within her reach.

Robert was fidgeting and pacing the lab where he and the others were waiting for the raid group to bring in the Visitor they had gone to get to use as a test subject. He was aware of just who was being brought in to test the red dust bacteria. 'I promised Robin that I wouldn't try to kill Brian,' he reminded himself. He was trying to keep his temper but it wasn't easy. He turned to pace the room once more when Tyler, Donovan and Brian came in. Once he saw Brian he couldn't stop himself. Robert reacted to the sight of the Visitor by punching Brian in the face. At that point Elias, Caleb and a few others dragged him off the restrained Visitor.

"Take him to the isolation chamber!" Julie snapped. She didn't know why Robert had reacted that way but she wasn't about to let this get out of hand. She had to test the bacteria on a Visitor, one of the enemy, but she wasn't going to let her people beat up a helpless Visitor just because they could. "Robert," she began.

"I only promised Robin I wouldn't try to kill him. I never said that I wouldn't hit him," Robert interrupted her. "I want to be there when you use the red dust on him." He knew he was being technical but he would at least keep to the letter of his agreement with his daughter.

Julie gapped at him for a moment before shutting her mouth and nodding. It was obvious to her that Robert thought that Brian was Elizabeth and William's father. She wasn't the only one to make that connection either. The rest of the resistance members also knew that there was only one Visitor who would create that sort of reaction. Robert wasn't the only one who glared at the retreating group taking Brian away. The group holding Robert slowly let go of him and wandered back to what they had been doing before Brian had been brought in.

Julie didn't know why Robert had decided that Brian was the twins' father but she couldn't tell him any differently because of doctor/patient privilege. Robin had told her that the Visitor who had donated the skin graft was the twins' father during one of her check ups. She had also said publicly that, that Visitor was Martin not Brian. Julie had to keep that knowledge to herself until Robin was ready to explain the situation. Julie was prepared to do that. 'And it isn't like we're not going to kill the man even if the red dust wasn't as lethal as we think,' she reassured herself.

Tyler and Donovan put Brian in the isolation chamber that the scientists had rigged up in the room where they had all of their lizards. It was a plastic cylinder with a single door, just large enough for Brian to sit down in as long as he crossed his legs. The door was sealed shut, although they kept the small slot in the door open so that he wouldn't suffocate. That was where they planned to introduce the red dust. "Don't worry, you won't be here for long," Tyler said with a deadly smirk.

Brian shuddered. He had seen that look on other faces. This Human was deadly and was going to enjoy whatever they were going to do to him. He punched the plastic but nothing happened other than his hand getting bruised. Tyler's smirk widened to a grin and then he and Donovan left, talking about getting their dinner. Brian sank down with his head in his hands. He was going to die.

Later that night Robin had made her decision. She made sure that Elizabeth was sound asleep before leaving the room. She didn't want her daughter to find out what was going to happen or why. She didn't know just how much English Elizabeth understood but she was far too young to understand that it didn't matter how her parents got together. She was only a month old even if she did look like a three year old. Martin had told her what was happening back on his homeworld and why. Brian didn't deserve to die as a test subject. He deserved to be executed for his crimes; both against her people and his own. As the resistance had gone to a lot of trouble to get Brian she couldn't just shoot him, so she slipped into the lab and tucked a vial of the red dust into her sleeve before walking down to the lizard room.

"Hello Brian," she said as she walked in

"Robin! Let me out of here!" Brian said excited. He jumped up and put his hands on the plastic of his tiny prison. He hadn't really thought that she would help him but he was desperate.

"Oh I'm not going to do that Brian," Robin said with a smile. "You see, the reason I'm here is that I don't think that you deserve to die just because you happen to be a Visitor who follows the Leader. You deserve to die because of your terrible sense of humor."

"What?" Brian asked confused. "That doesn't make any sense!"

"Oh yes it does Brian," Robin said as she walked around the chamber. "You see until you and Diana pulled your little practical joke and did this," she held up her Battle Bride mark, "Martin was the heir to his house. Well to be more precise, he and his brother were co-heirs. They're twins you know. Anyway, his dad really didn't like the fact that you two married one of his extra special sons off to food. Now, the fact that I had his twin children will probably help me but it won't help you. Martin can't ever take his father's place now and his brother will have to do without him."

She stopped in front of the door. "You do understand what I'm talking about now don't you?" Brian shook his head. Robin sighed, "Just as well that I married Martin then because you are really stupid." Brian looked affronted. "The two of you triggered a civil war you idiot! Your own people are dying because of your stupid joke!" Brian shook his head in horror. "Oh yes you did. Martin's father declared war on the Leader and his followers because of what you two did. And you thought it was funny. That's why you deserve to die Brian, and what better way than this?" She held up the vial she had pulled out of her sleeve. "Goodbye Brian and by the way, Martin hopes that Zon will take you on a trip through all twelve hells. Personally, I agree." With that, she dropped the vial into the chamber and slammed the small slot in the door shut so that the bacteria would stay in the chamber and not escape into the rest of the room

The vial hit the bottom of the chamber and shattered, releasing a small puff of dust that quickly filled the chamber. "Robin what did you do?!!" Brian shouted.

"With any luck I've killed you Brian," she said calmly. Within moments it became obvious that Brian was having trouble breathing. Choking on the dust in the air Brian began to tear at his throat and face trying to breathe. It was no use, he was dead within a few minutes.

Father Andrew walked in to find Brian dead on the floor of the chamber and Robin kneeling in front of it. He had been coming to see if the Visitor would accept a last visit from a priest, even if it was one that wasn't his own species, much less religion. "ROBERT, JULIE! ROBIN'S USED THE RED DUST!" he yelled as he left the room at his top speed. He had to get Elizabeth out of here. There was no telling what Robin would do to her daughter now that she'd killed her child's father. As much as he didn't like it, there was only one place where the little girl would be safe. He had to take her to her father's people.

Robin sighed to herself and straightened up. She knew that someone would come in and see this sooner or later. She had just hoped that it would be later. She really didn't want to answer any questions.


	17. Chapter 17

Chapter 17

On the Visitor's homeworld only a few ships had made it back from Earth carrying a partial cargo. Oh their holds were full of animals and water from Earth, but most of the cargo bays filled with the special containers to hold Humans were empty. There hadn't been time to fill them up as the Humans were still being soothed into letting the fleet do whatever the High Command wanted. But there will still Humans on board and most of those had been shipped off to the front lines to be used as cannon fodder in the war against the Alliance.

Personally, Jake Henderson thought that the war between the two groups of Visitors was completely stupid, but then most wars were. As a veteran of Vietnam, he felt that he was more than qualified to make that statement. He was the only one who had any combat experience and had pulled his small group of Humans into a fairly competent unit. Then one day, a few months after they had arrived, a group of Visitors had walked into his encampment and had shot all of the Visitors who had been in charge of them. While he had expected for the new Visitors to try and kill them in order to eat them, that hadn't been the case. The leader of the group had explained that not only were the Visitors involved in a war with another group of Visitors on another continent (the Alliance) but there was also a small civil war going on between the Houses of the Visitors who had gone to Earth in the first place.

This new group of Visitors was setting the Humans free and inviting them to join their side of the civil war. Jake and his small group of Humans had readily agreed. Now he was in charge of all of the Humans who lived in the Sanctuary. In his former life Jake had been a soldier. After he had left the army with an honorable discharge he had hit the road on his bike and never looked back. He had become a bit of a renegade, either riding his bike or the waves of the ocean trying to forget. Now he was smack dab back in the middle of another war, on another planet, helping alien lizards fight their version of Mussolini, Stalin or Hitler, only this time he was one of the ones in charge. Life took some strange turns.

But what he found most strange was that he was fast becoming best friends with the son of the guy in charge, even to the point of helping to plan the most incredibly stupid raid that he had ever heard of. He got that these people did the kidnapping of brides thing, he really did. One of his friends back on Earth had a passion for Native American history and had loved spinning stories for Jake. So he was very familiar with the concept. And he understood that they also used the custom to their political advantage when they could. But for the Lord's sake, did Philip really have to plan to raid the betrothed bride of the Leader's only son?

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Martin had learned how to keep things from his brother. There wasn't anything like living inside someone else's head to make you learn to value privacy and living under the Leader's rule had only hastened the lesson. So he was able to keep his rage at Father Andrew from Elizabeth when she fearfully woke him with her mental cry of 'Daddy gone?!'. He realized what had happened from the images that were shooting through Elizabeth's mind. He soothed her, letting her know that the older priest was mistaken and that he was just fine. He didn't know who was dead but it most certainly wasn't him. On the other hand, there was one Visitor male that he was all too aware that his wife wanted dead. If somehow Robin had gotten a hold of Brian, Martin didn't hold much hope for his continued survival. But then he wasn't all that fond of Brian either. There was just something about having a laser pistol shoved into his head that annoyed him.

With her fear gone Elizabeth complained, 'Itchy!'

Martin agreed as he got up out of bed and sat down on the floor, falling into the position for meditation by reflex. 'Yes, shedding does itch and it's annoying too. But you can't grow without it,' he told her. He was also keeping his amazement at her growing abilities to himself. Although he and his brother were also linked mentally, they had never exchanged actual words. He felt her annoyance. He sent her a strong feeling of love and firmness. The sigh she heaved was so like his brother's when Martin had convinced him to go along with a prank that he wanted to laugh.

Martin mentally watched over his daughter as a slightly flustered Father Andrew dealt with the changes that Elizabeth's shedding had brought about this time. Martin knew he was being petty, but he couldn't help but feel a bit of vindictive pleasure that Father Andrew was having a bit of a hard time dealing with a child that was suddenly much larger than she had been an hour earlier. He did wait until it became obvious that Father Andrew wasn't bringing Elizabeth to him before deciding that if Diana didn't kill the priest then he would. As the security captain flew Father Andrew and Elizabeth up to the mother ship Martin coached Elizabeth, showing her mentally what he meant as he taught her how to survive Diana. He had several years of dealing with the female to know just how Elizabeth should react in order to ensure that Diana was intrigued, but not to the point where she would harm his daughter. He didn't want her to end up like so many others had at Diana's hands.

Elizabeth followed his instructions when Father Andrew brought her in to see Diana, her face remaining blank even as her thoughts reached out to Martin. 'Lady sick Daddy,' she thought. She could see a darkness inside Diana that she had never seen before. She had seen injuries and illnesses and watched as her mother, Aunt Harmony and Aunt Julie fixed them but this was different and she didn't understand it.

'Yes Elizabeth, Diana is sick. Her illness isn't inside her body but in her mind. That is why you must always do as I have taught you. If you don't, she might eat you.' Martin didn't want to scare Elizabeth but he had to make her understand. The worst part was that he wasn't lying to her. If Diana got it into her head for whatever reason, she just might eat his daughter.

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When Robert and Robin realized that Father Andrew had left, taking Elizabeth with him, the resistance moved once more. By now they had it down to a science. This time they took over an abandoned coast guard station, complete with lighthouse. Robin helped with the move, although the fact that everyone was either watching her, waiting for her to break, or tiptoeing around her like she was made of glass was driving her crazy. She had not spoken since she had discovered the kidnapping. She knew that was the reason for the other's behavior but at the moment she really couldn't care less. She was hanging on to her temper by a thread and they were only making the situation worse.

Finally Robert couldn't take her silence any longer. "Robin," he began.

"Do you go to hell if you kill a priest?" she snarled as she slammed a box of bandages on a shelf. She was helping to set up yet another field hospital. People were streaming in and out of the large room around them.

Robert sighed. He was sure he would feel the same way if it had been Katie Father Andrew had taken but he still tried to make her understand. "Honey he was afraid for Elizabeth. We all were. After you killed her father like that,"

Robin interrupted, "Her father? Whatever gave you that idea? He wasn't Elizabeth and William's father!"

Robert paused in putting down his own box of medical supplies. "But you liked him and I know you've been protecting him!" he said trying to understand.

"Brian wasn't their father! He was the sick creep who held the gun to Martin's head during Diana's sick little shotgun wedding and perverted private sex show!" Robin yelled. With that she stormed out.

"Wedding?" Robert asked no one, stunned at his daughter's outburst. The second part of Robin's statement hadn't registered yet. He looked around and noticed that while most of those in the room were staring after Robin in shock, Tyler and Donovan weren't. "You two knew about this," he stated.

Mike shrugged. He hadn't known about Diana's private porn show but it didn't surprise him. Diana was sick enough to do it. "Martin told me when he asked me to carry their letters back and forth. It was the only way they could talk to each other while Robin was pregnant."

"That was the button I pushed," Ham admitted. "I didn't realize that I basically told him that he didn't care if she and the kids lived or died. I didn't get a chance to say anything else before he was beating the crap outa me."

Mike smirked at Tyler, "And he did all that damage in less than two minutes too. It took me that long to drag Martin off of him."

Tyler shot Donovan a dirty look. "Don't think I didn't notice that you waited until he threw me into a wall."

Mike didn't miss a beat. "If you can't take it, you shouldn't dish it out," he pointed out reasonably.

Robin returned with another box. "Wedding?" Robert asked again. "The two of you are married?"

"Yes wedding," Robin snapped. "Martin's my husband and my children's father. It's even legal, I asked! Live with it." She set down the box and left, but not before Robert saw her tears.

Robert stood still for a moment absorbing the shock. Then he looked over at one of the other scientists. "Jack, help me set the lab the rest of the way up. We need to get to work on a way to protect the Fifth Columnists from the Red Dust."


	18. Chapter 18

Chapter 18

Elizabeth was happily playing with the computer that Diana had allowed her access to, although she was careful to follow Daddy's rules about what to show Diana. She didn't want the sick lady to eat her and make her go away. She was excited. She had figured out that she could make words. Not only was she learning to spell them on the computer, she had also learned how to say them. She showed her accomplishment to Diana, more because she was the only person there than anything else.

Diana wasn't happy that her first spoken word was Pretenama, or peace in the Visitor's language. She kept insisting that it wasn't in their destiny. Elizabeth wasn't happy, knowing that peace had to come sooner or later. But there wasn't anything she could do about Diana, so she went to play with the toy blocks that Diana had given her. She didn't pay attention to the talk that Diana was having with the security person who came in while she was playing. He wasn't that interesting, and neither was their discussion. Elizabeth was far more interested in the city that she was building.

When the security person left Diana came over to sit beside the table where Elizabeth's toy city was under construction. Elizabeth could tell that she was in one of her sicker times because the darkness was getting bigger. Sometimes the darkness in Diana's mind seemed smaller to Elizabeth and that was when she could do or say things that might make Diana unhappy. Diana didn't do anything very bad during those times. But Daddy had told her to be very careful not to provoke Diana any more than she had to. So when Diana knocked her blocks over Elizabeth just looked blankly at her. She didn't want Diana to eat her. Believing that she had taught Elizabeth a lesson, Diana walked out.

Elizabeth heaved a sigh as soon as the door shut. Daddy told her that he was very proud of her and that so was Mommy. That made Elizabeth feel better. She loved Daddy and Mommy. They were far better than Diana. She missed them. She hoped that peace would come soon so that she and Daddy could go home to Mommy. 'And Grandpa and Aunt Polly and Aunt Katie and Aunt Harmony and Uncle Willie and,' Elizabeth continued to list all of the people that she loved and missed in the resistance as she rebuilt her toy city. A city that she dreamed her peoples could live in peace with each other in.

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It had taken Julie's team a month and a half to find the well, antidote wasn't the correct word but it was close enough. They couldn't kill the Red Dust in the Visitor's systems because that would defeat the purpose of developing the bacteria in the first place. What they had done was found a way to neutralize the toxins that the bacteria released. It was those toxins that were lethal to the Visitors. Once that was achieved they began shipping the Red Dust through Tyler and Chris' contacts to the other resistance groups around the world.

Robin was amazed at how fully the science team had thrown themselves into finding something to protect the Fifth Columnists, her father most of all. She had thought that once he knew about what had happened between her and Martin, he would have gone gunning for her husband. Instead Robert had been the one who had spent the most time in the lab trying to find a way to protect him.

Robin and Harmony spent their time practicing giving Willie shots of sterile water. As the antidote would take up to twenty minutes in pill form to enter the person's system, while the toxin became fatal within one to two minutes, the first dose of the antidote would be given in liquid form. The shot would take effect almost immediately, giving the Fifth Columnists a chance to survive. "You sure do have a tough hide Willie," Robin said in amazement as she looked at the slightly bent needle. "Thanks for letting us practice on you."

Willie simply shrugged. "If you do not earn, then it will be much worse when you must give these in battle," he pointed out.

"It's still sweet of you to let us treat you like a pin cushion Willie," Harmony said. "And you mean learn."

"Yes, learn," Willie agreed, although he wasn't paying that much attention to his English. The two gave each other such loving looks that Robin was a bit jealous. She missed Martin and Elizabeth so much it was like having a hole cut into her chest.

Robin's thoughts turned to her last meeting with Martin. She was so glad that he was connected to Elizabeth even as she both envied him the gift and was extremely grateful that he was the one that had it instead of her. The idea of being mentally linked to another person sort of freaked her out. She had no wish to scare and therefore scar her daughter. It was far better for her to be linked to the one person who considered the link normal. Martin had reassured her that Elizabeth was doing well, although she had done one of her accelerated aging things again. It had made Robin angry at Father Andrew all over again to find out that Elizabeth had said her first word and that she had missed it. But Diana hadn't hurt her and Elizabeth was busy having fun with the toys that Diana had given her. She only wished that she had been able to tell Martin about the Red Dust. Operational security sucked in her opinion. 'Oh well, this will all be over soon,' she thought. Then they could all be together again.

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Martin wasn't happy with the resistance. Not so much that they had a new weapon to use, that was always a good thing. But the rumors that he had heard were spreading too far and too wide too quickly for anyone's good. If Diana and John got wind of the new weapon, whatever it was, before the resistance was ready to use it, then this entire world would pay the price. He shuddered at the memory of what they had done to the colony world that had defied the Leader's orders.

It had happened just before the fleet had left for Earth. The Leader had used the colony world as a place of exile for those who followed the Path of Peace, a religion that had been reduced to a cult under the Leader's rule. He had believed that the harshness of the planet would show them that obeying him was the wiser course of action. But they had heard about what the Leader had planned for Earth and the Humans who called the planet home. Being pacifists (a philosophy that Martin had never been able to understand) they had refused his order to provide his fleet with technicians. The Leader had turned one of older mother ships into a bomb that had destroyed the entire planet. The planet wasn't much of a loss in Martin's opinion but while he could never begin to understand them, the lost lives of those living there had impacted him greatly.

He couldn't stand the thought of that happening again. And he knew that Diana and John had a similar device on board the LA mother ship. It was one of the main reasons that he had founded the Fifth Column in the first place. The Fifth Column hadn't done anything until they had gotten to know the Humans, being rather uncertain if they were sentient enough, well truthfully if they were actually PEOPLE. These days Martin looked back on his and his people's uncertainty with a little amusement. He couldn't believe that he had been so afraid of the Leader's people and so worried that his people were risking their lives for nothing. Now one of his best friends was Human and so was his wife, as well as his children being half Human. He couldn't think of them as anything other than people now.

'Right down to being as stubborn as a rock crite,' he thought as he tried to explain just how dangerous this could be to Donovan. "Tell me about this weapon," he pleaded with his friend. He had been Diana's aide and that had given him a great deal of access to most of the fleet. Whatever weapon they had developed, he would be the one who would know how to deploy it best.

"It's a toxin and takes a couple of minutes to take effect," Donovan admitted. "We planned to disperse it into the atmosphere."

Martin was confused. "A small amount of toxin won't be able to get rid of the fleet."

Mike grinned. He loved this part. "Not in the quantities we can make no. But the toxin is actually a side effect. The toxin is produced by a bacteria and bacteria multiply. By spreading even a small amount of the bacteria in the atmosphere, we end up with a self sustaining protection against your people.

Martin nodded. He did understand the impact that sort of weapon would have. "And what about Elizabeth? Or my people?" he asked.

Mike knew that question was coming. "Elizabeth is immune. We think that's because she's more Human than Visitor in her physiology. As for the rest of you, Julie and her team have come up with a medication that should protect you."

"I'll tell you everything I can about the mother ship, Mike. But I don't see how you can get to the device before Diana will set it off. And she will if she thinks she's loosing." Martin was sure of that. He did think that a small group just might, maybe be able to get to the bridge of the mother ship before the device was activated, but it was a long shot.

"I have to tell the others about this. I'll get back to you with whatever we decide," Mike said. He knew that no one would be happy to learn that the mother ship could and would be turned into a nuke.

"As fast as you can Mike. We don't have much time left," Martin said before leaving the back room of the restaurant. He was so tired of this war. He just wanted to settle down with Robin and Elizabeth. 'Zon was it too much to ask?' he thought.


	19. Chapter 19

Chapter 19

Commander Lydia (and oh how she hated that she had trained herself to respond to that name!) was finally home. As a security officer in the Leader's fleet she had been swamped with dealing with the London resistance group but now she would never have to deal with the blasted Humans again. 'Well, I won't unless they are on a plate,' she thought vindictively. Her home was set in what had once been a beautiful, thriving valley but it was now a desert. The Sanctuary itself was underground like almost all of the cities that housed her people and Lydia preferred it that way. The open air cities of the Humans had been difficult for her to adjust to.

She was just stepping down out of her shuttle, the last one of the night. It was pure chance that she managed to look in just the right direction, a glance at the rising sun. Sweeping down from the stone walls that rose above the entrance to her home Sanctuary was a group of wind riders, men who rode the small anti-gravity disks that were most often used in hand to hand combat matches for the entertainment of others. She didn't particularly care for that form of entertainment, preferring to engage in combat than watch it but for some reason she stopped and watched the approaching wind riders for a second.

The split second that she stopped and watched was her undoing. In that small moment of time, the six men opened fire and she realized just what had bothered her about them. They were Humans, not her own people. She had been around the cursed mammals for so long that she had forgotten how strange they were. The one in the lead wore black leather over his sun dark skin and his white hair blew in the wind. He wore a harness over his shoulders; she couldn't see what it held strapped to his back. He let out a howl that jolted her into action. She reached for her side arm and drew it but as it cleared the holster they were on her.

But as the first one reached her, he simply swept by, going for the guards beyond. It was the second one that knocked the pistol out of her hand and simply lifted her over his shoulders. She screeched at the top of her lungs, she fought with everything she could bring to bear on him but he still hung on. The Humans took out the Home Guard and those Lydia was traveling with. She was the only survivor. And no matter how she struggled and fought she couldn't break free. Her captor matched her move for move.

That was her first clue that something was amiss. She should have been able to overpower any Human hand to hand. It was only when weapons came into the picture that Humans were able to win. The second clue was that no one came to help the one who had her. She spat venom and curses at them in equal measure. They ignored the curses and simply avoided her venom. They quickly traveled to an isolated spot where they had a small transport hidden. It was when they jumped off the anti-gravity disks and piled into the transport that she got her final clue. When she was dumped on her backside inside the transport she tore at the skin on her captor's neck. It tore away, revealing reptilian scales. Her captor was wearing a Human body suit just as she was. Her shock immobilized her enough that her captor was able to secure her to a seat. Her captor was one of her own people!

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The adults called it a meeting. Robin called it just short of a school yard brawl. The only thing they weren't doing was actually throwing physical punches. The verbal punches though were quite vicious. Robin didn't really care what they were saying though. It was simply the same old argument, to fight or not, with the threat of nukes thrown in. For Robin, there was only one thing that was important, Diana had her daughter and this was the one way she could get her back. So she sat, watched and listened as the others argued back and forth. Some were for attacking the mother ship and capturing it before Diana could set off the bomb. Others were all for doing something else, anything else that wouldn't provoke Diana into using the device. The trouble was Robin didn't think that there was anything that wouldn't provoke her. And her baby, no her little girl, was sitting in the middle of the biggest bomb ever created.

But it was Elias who really made the most impact. The simple words that he said would forever echo in her mind. "There is no other way. There's no time. Look, if Martin knows about the red dust, then Diana does too. And if she doesn't then she will in a few days. Hey, I mean as raggedy and as ordinary as this little bunch is, we're the last shot before the buzzer. If we attack, if we attack at least we have a fighting chance. We do nothing; we've signed this planet's death warrant." It was no surprise to Robin that the vote ended up in favor of the attack, mostly because Elias was right. There was no more time to fool around with anything. It was either this, or they were all dead.

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Like any other military organization, the fleet ran on rumors. And the most sought after rumors were of what Diana was doing or planning. Most junior officers and enlisted personnel considered that information to be vital to their personal survival. Diana had an unfortunate tendency to grab the nearest low ranking body when she was in the middle of one of her experiments. So the fact that Diana had a little girl in her quarters spread throughout the mother ship like a wild fire. Some were concerned for the child. Others were worried for their own hides. It was Hilary (who was in charge of feeding the officers) who confirmed the wildest rumor of all, that the child was half Visitor and half Human. When that rumor was confirmed, even the most skeptical began to believe the rumor about Lieutenant Martin and his Human Battle Bride.

Barbra was quietly inundated with new recruits, so many in fact that she was able to get most of the still loyal people off of Pamela's ship and onto Diana's. In the end, it wasn't all that hard to convince Stephen or to have him convince John to let her do it either. Having people that the two men knew were loyal to them on Diana's ship was worth the bother of transferring the larger groups. In the end, the only ones loyal to the Fifth Column that were still on board Diana's ship were volunteers who knew that they were very likely to die. Whatever weapon the Humans had, it was supposed to be devastating enough to kill them all. Martin didn't want any of his people to die, so he informed Barbra what precautions to take. She would be telling those who were staying behind. Mostly those precautions consisted of keeping a small breathing mask close to hand on the morning they were going to attack. Barbra provided him with a copy of the mother ship's floor plans so that he could plan out the attack.

After she had delivered the plans and returned to the Mother ship, Barbra was called into Diana's office. She wasn't surprised to see the body of the Human priest lying on the floor, nor was she surprised to see that Martin's daughter was hiding in the corner. Like most children confronted with a monster, young Elizabeth was doing her best to make sure that she wasn't noticed. Personally, Barbra wished that she had the same option. "Dispose of that," Diana said. "Why has so many of the crew been transferred to Pamela's ship?"

"Those who may have questionable loyalties have been transferred to where Security can be certain that they won't cause greater problems," Barbra answered carefully. She didn't know why Diana was so agitated but the body and the child's behavior were clear signs that she was. Diana smiled in satisfaction and left. Barbra sighed in relief. Elizabeth poked her head out around the corner. "You ok sweetie?" Barbra asked. Elizabeth nodded and then looked over at Father Andrew. Barbra sighed again, although for a different reason this time. In some ways the Human was lucky. Diana had given him a swift death. Martin hadn't been planning on one. "I'll take care of him sweetie. Why don't you go and play with your toys?"

Elizabeth shook her head and went over to the table. She picked up a leather bound book and took it back over to her corner. She settled in to read and gave Barbra a smile. "You can read?" Barbra asked amazed. Elizabeth nodded and focused her attention on the book. Barbra shook her head and bent over to grab the corpse by the wrists. Diana would be back soon and she had better have this dealt with before that happened. Maybe she would give the child a copy of the book of prophets. Hopefully that would help counter act the poison that Diana was no doubt filling her young mind with.


	20. Chapter 20

Chapter 20

As much as Martin knew Donovan hadn't liked using his son to feed information to the enemy, he was glad that his friend had done so. Diana's own pride in her creations through the conversion process would be her downfall and their salvation. He knew that she would ensure that the fleet's shock troops were stationed at the jet bases around the world before dawn. They would stay there until after the battle was won and most likely they would die there. As for his people, all was in readiness. Those who were on Pamela's ship would take it over, led by Barbara. She hadn't wanted to take on the responsibility but Martin had been adamant. She was the best one to take the ship back home. He was staying here and so was Diana's ship. He would make good on his people's promises to the Humans by making sure that the information the ship held on everything from science to mechanics was given to them. Those on board Diana's ship were ready as well. They knew what type of weapon was being used and how to avoid it if they could. They would be at the critical points when the attack came. No one would be able to shut down the ventilation systems and the entire ship would be flooded with the bacteria. Those who wished to stay and couldn't fight, a surprising group of about fifty, had already abandoned their posts and were hidden in LA. Those who could fight, about thirty, were going with him to the resistance's new headquarters.

They loaded up every weapon and uniform that they could get their hands on. It wouldn't matter now if the count came up short. With a massive offensive on the ground, most would believe that either a lot of people were taking no chance and arming up a little heavier or that something internal was going on. With the war going on back home as well as the power plays that were always taking place in the fleet, it would be a few days before someone thought to really question the discrepancies; that is if those taking the counts weren't on his side in the first place. Martin flew the transport ship himself, mostly so that he wouldn't have to think. Although he was looking forward to the end of this war, he wasn't looking forward to his inevitable confrontation with Robin's father. And it would happen sooner or later, he just wasn't sure how soon it would come, nor was he sure what would happen when it did.

It was late afternoon when he landed the transport and he and his people were quickly swept up in the meet and greet portion of getting to know their counterparts among the Humans. By the time that Martin's people had been divided up and led off by various members of the resistance he was getting a bit worried, well more worried than he had been before. He hadn't seen Robin or Robert anywhere.

Julie correctly guessed what was going through his mind. "They're in the lab, arguing," she said gently as she led him in the right direction. This was one confrontation that was best done in private.

"What are they arguing about?" Martin asked apprehensively. There were a few subjects that he knew about that could have caused the argument but he was sure there were just as many he didn't.

Julie grimaced. "Robin is insisting on going with us to the mother ship. She's learned the skills she'll need in the last six months, but Robert wants her to stay here and look after the kids. He's trying to tell her that she'll be needed to help with any casualties. But the truth is because this is the last battle, any and all ground casualties can go to the hospital. We're more likely to need her with us."

"Last battle," Martin sighed. "That sounds really good."

"Well," Julie said grimly. "We either win or we become extinct." She still wasn't happy with how the vote had gone but this was one decision that she couldn't make unilaterally. The vote had gone the other way and that was that.

"We'll win," Martin said confidently. "My only worry is whether or not we'll be able to rescue Elizabeth or not. It would be just like Diana to kill Elizabeth when she figures out she's loosing."

Julie nodded, "It'll be all over soon." She pointed to a set of doors that led to their lab and went off to make sure that they had enough live animals to feed their guests. She didn't want Chris' rude remarks to become a reality. It wouldn't be very polite to have their guests hunt their own food down in the dormitories.

Without thinking about it, Martin moved into the lab as silently as he could. He didn't mean to sneak up on the two Humans arguing in lab. Walking silently was second nature to him, had been since he was a child. You couldn't catch your prey if you were loud and if you were quick enough and quiet enough, you wouldn't have to share it either, although he and Philip had always shared with each other. So he wasn't prepared for Robin to jump and screech, much less hit him in the arm and yell, "Don't do that! You scared about five years off of me!" Not having heard the expression before Martin nodded with an extremely confused look on his face. Robin ignored it and rounded back on her father. "I'm going. I'm an adult, we're married and we're going on this mission together. I am not going to stay behind when I can be useful." With that, Robin turned back to loading up her medic bag.

Robert turned to Martin. "Do you think you can talk her out of this? Harmony's going up. She's not going to be needed." While he may have hated Martin a little less now that he understood the circumstances surrounding Elizabeth's conception, he still didn't like him. However Robin apparently did and he wasn't above using that to try and keep his daughter safe.

Martin shot him a look that clearly said he thought Robert was crazy but answered, "I do see why you wouldn't want her to go with us but truthfully I'm more concerned about reuniting Elizabeth with both of us as quickly as possible. She's been very frightened by Diana."

"What did that psycho bitch do now?" Robin growled.

"She shot Father Andrew in front of Elizabeth," Martin said flatly. "Elizabeth is alright but I want her safe and sound as soon as possible. I've told her that we're coming to get her in the morning."

Robin turned back to Robert, the look on her face daring him to deny her once more. Robert simply raised his hands in surrender. "I'll go tell Poly she'll be in charge of the kids during the raids." He knew that Polly was capable. She was now fourteen years old and far more dependable that Robin had been at that age. The difference between his two daughters hadn't come so much from the differences in their personalities as from the experiences in their lives Robert knew. He just wished that none of his three girls had been exposed to this life and he hated that Robin wasn't going to be able to walk away from it like Polly and Katie were. His younger two girls were going to be able to lead normal lives in the future. Robin would never have that opportunity now, not with a half alien child and an alien husband. He turned to the person he still held second most responsible for that. "Don't bother to come back if they don't," he growled at Martin before he turned and left.

"That went a lot better than I was expecting," Martin admitted.

"I told him about us when we moved in here, mostly because I was so pissed off at Father Andrew. He's had a while to get used to the idea. Don't think that it means he's ok with us being married though," she warned. "He's still very angry about the whole thing. Now, I need your help getting ready for tomorrow. You and the people who came with you will get your first dose of the antidote in pill form in the morning. I need to know how many of your people are still on Diana's mother ship and will need antidote shots." Robin held up a syringe. "The shot works a lot faster than the pills." Martin nodded and put his head together with Robin's. The toxin and how to protect his people from it weren't the only medical problem Robin would probably be facing.

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Unlike the perversion that Diana had inflicted on his brother, Philip's wedding to his Battle Bride was done with as much pomp and circumstance as possible as if to make up for it. Lydia had been of two minds about her new status. On one side her husband to be had earned her respect, both for his prowess as a warrior and his compliance with tradition. His raid against her home sanctuary had gone off without a single casualty on his side and she had been captured without injury to herself or to him. On the other side he had taken only Humans on the raid with him. She really couldn't understand how someone who was so respectful of their traditions could do something so very, radically opposed to the fundamentals of their society. Humans were mammals and therefore inferior. How could he ally himself with them?

It was one of her attendants who had finally informed her of just who and what had prompted her capture and marriage. The same attendant also helpfully held her robes out of the way as she puked her guts out. The very idea of sex with a Human was nauseating enough, although she was aware of a few perverts who had done so. But to actually make one into a Battle Bride for a House Heir! What was worse was that she knew, deep down in her soul, that the Leader would simply shrug off his Consort's actions. There was no way that she could support the Leader now; nor could her House. With her House changing sides in this war it would soon be over and the Leader and his son would soon die. Too bad, she had liked her once betrothed.


	21. Chapter 21

Ham Tyler got up at two a.m. the next morning. While Donovan had the raid on Diana's mother ship and Robert Maxwell had the diversion attack on the Visitor's security headquarters, he was in charge of the real attack. A full dozen hot air balloons with red dust payloads would be launching just before dawn local time under his command. There were also a half dozen other groups around the LA area that he had already given balloons, helium and red dust to. As long as Donovan and Martin didn't blow up the planet, the war was won. He proceeded to walk down the halls of what had been the officer's quarters, banging on the doors and grinning his head off. "UP! UP! Everybody up!" Today was going to be a great day.

He stuck his head in Donovan and Julie's room. "Up and at 'em Gooder! We've got lizards to kill!" Tyler laughed when he saw a rather delicate hand reach out from underneath the blankets and flip him off before he continued on. Maxwell was already up and he was getting his daughters out of their bed when Tyler checked on him. Robert waved in his general direction and continued to try and wake up Polly. Katie was already up, bouncing on the bed beside her sister.

Several doorways later Tyler poked his head in Robin and Harmony's room. He wasn't surprised to see a blanket hanging down that bisected the room between the two beds, nor was he surprised to see that Martin and Willie were there wrapped around their ladies. What did surprise him was that they were all still asleep. He had been loud enough to wake the dead. "HEY! Everybody up!" He stalked over to the end of the blanket and pushed it aside, only to find that Martin was pointing his laser pistol at him. "Times a wastin' kids," he grinned and turned around and left.

Robin grumbled something into her pillow but started getting out of bed. Martin spent a short moment relishing the memory of beating the Human to a pulp but then sighed and joined Robin in getting dressed. He really didn't like Tyler but Donovan trusted him and he had helped Robin during her pregnancy, so he'd put up with the man when he had to. He finished putting on his uniform and turned to help Robin with hers.

This was going to be a hectic morning even if everything went perfectly. The three prong attack here in LA was planned for nine in the morning, but those who were dispensing the red dust into the atmosphere had at least five hours of hard work to do before that. It took time to prepare, load and launch each hot air balloon and many smaller groups were loading tiny amounts of red dust into thousands of smaller balloons that they would release at nine. Those balloons would burst once they reached a certain height, releasing the red dust.

Those who were attacking Visitor Security Headquarters actually had the easiest job of the day, although it was much more dangerous than handling the red dust. After being resistance members for more than a year, they had learned the hard way how to conduct a raid on a Visitor target. They were now very good at it and everyone was well aware of what their jobs were.

Naturally those who were making the early morning raid on Diana's mother ship had the most dangerous and difficult job of all. Sneaking on board the mother ship was the easy part of that raid. Martin already had clearance to bring the freighter on board, or rather the freighter captain that only existed in the mother ship's computers did. Once they were on board they would be splitting into two groups, one heading directly to the bridge and the other would be dumping the freighter's cargo of red dust, which had been loaded last night, into the ventilation system. The first group would leave the freighter with hopefully enough time to reach the bridge before the synchronized attack began.

Martin was knocked out of his musings by a sharp pain in his arm. Instinctively he hissed and grabbed at his arm, right where the Battle Bride mark was located. The pain wasn't his, he realized. It was Philip's and the pain had woken Elizabeth. 'Daddy?' she cried, worried about the pain.

'It's all right sweetie,' he soothed. 'Your Uncle Philip just got married. The pain comes from a part of my people's marriage ceremony. Usually a person getting married takes medicine to keep from feeling the pain but your Uncle Philip wanted me to know that he was married. I can feel when he gets hurt and he can feel when I get hurt. That was how he found out that I got married to your Mom.'

'Ok Daddy,' Elizabeth thought. She could feel the pain easing right away so her Uncle Philip had to have taken medicine for his arm. 'Are you and Mommy coming to get me soon?'

'Very soon sweetheart,' Martin sent. 'We're coming to get you this morning. Don't let Diana or anyone else know. You might see some people falling down and clawing at their faces or throats. Don't worry about it. We're putting something into the air of the mother ship but it won't hurt you.'

'Will it hurt you Daddy? What about Uncle Willie?' Elizabeth worried. She knew the difference between Visitors and Humans and had a pretty good idea that whatever her parents were going to be putting into the air would only work on Visitors.

'Your Uncle Willie and I are going to be taking medicine to make sure that it doesn't hurt us. Try to go back to sleep, it's going to be a very busy day,' Martin said before returning his attention to his surroundings.

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Elizabeth sighed as she felt her daddy's attention turn away from her, but she knew that if she needed him her daddy would be there in her mind in an instant. He was always there when she needed him. She wouldn't be able to go back to sleep though. Today she was going to go home.

She got up out of her bunk and put on her uniform. It was just like the ones that the adult visitors wore. Diana didn't like it when she wore human clothes. Elizabeth thought that both human and visitor clothes had something wrong with them. The visitor uniform kept her warm in ways that human clothes didn't, but human clothes were much nicer to look at and move around in. They also came with real pockets instead of the belt pouches that didn't have anywhere near enough space for anything or the vest that sort of made an open sided hiding place in the front and back. She missed her pockets, especially when she wanted to carry something, like now.

Elizabeth looked around the small area that Diana had given her. She couldn't take the hairbrush with her, besides the one that Mommy had was much nicer and didn't pull her hair the way Diana's did. She had the two books she had been given, but they were rather big. She turned Father Andrew's bible over in her hands for a moment before attempting to stuff it into the front of her uniform. It didn't make too much of a bulge but it was obvious that something was there. She shrugged. It wasn't like Diana didn't know she had it. Then she placed the visitor book in the back of her uniform. That actually fit better as it was flatter than the bible, although it was larger.

Satisfied with the arrangement, she looked over her blocks. They were the last thing that she wanted to take with her, but she had no idea how she was going to manage that. They were far too bulky to carry or to hide. Sighing she sat down and began to build yet another city. It would be some time before her parents arrived, and even if she couldn't take the blocks with her when they came, at least she could play with them one more time.


	22. Chapter 22

Diana had come for Elizabeth soon after she had begun playing with her blocks. The sick lady had been pleased to see that Elizabeth was up and dressed. Elizabeth wasn't sure that was a good thing, as the darkness was bigger than usual inside her. So she didn't make a protest as Diana brought her up to the bridge. The moment Diana's back was turned, Elizabeth went and hid in a corner where she could see what was happening.

At first, it was very boring. People moved from station to station calmly and did things to the computers that Elizabeth didn't bother to try and figure out. She'd much rather have been left in Diana's quarters with her blocks. She didn't make a sound though. Daddy had told her that he and Mommy were coming to get her soon and the last thing she wanted was for Diana to send her someplace where Daddy couldn't find her.

When John came over to see Diana, Elizabeth could see that he wasn't very happy. That wasn't unusual. Most of the Visitors she had met, aside from Daddy and Uncle Willy, weren't very happy. Daddy said that was because everyone was fighting. She could understand that. She didn't like the fighting either, but Daddy said it would be over soon and they could go live with Mommy.

When Diana showed John the special computer, it made John even more unhappy. Elizabeth frowned, not understanding just what it was about the computer that was upsetting him. Daddy had taught her that it wasn't polite to look into other people's minds. They couldn't talk that way with her. The only ones who could were Daddy and Uncle Philip. Even Daddy and Uncle Philip couldn't talk to each other that way. They could only hear how each other felt.

Daddy had also told her that it was dangerous to look into the minds of people who were sick like Diana. If she looked too deep, she might get sick too. She was never to look closer than it took to see how sick they were. There were times though when he'd said it was ok, mostly if she thought she was in danger, or someone was trying to make her understand something. The way John was looking at the computer and Diana made Elizabeth nervous, so she looked into his mind to see what was wrong.

When she found the information, Elizabeth was horrified and terribly frightened. She had never realized just how sick Diana was, or the Leader for that matter, that they could turn an entire world into nothing more than grave that would continue to kill for more years than even they could imagine. 'DADDY!' she cried.

'Don't worry sweetheart,' Martin soothed as the information flooded his mind in her fright. 'I know all about it and I've already told everyone else. Mommy and I are going to the bridge first to stop them from turning the bomb computer on. Barbra is going to meet us with another computer that we hope will be able to shut it off if we can't get there in time. We're all going to do our best to make sure that doesn't happen.' Martin held his breath until her fright subsided. They were loading up the transport and he really did not need his daughter screaming in his mind because she was scared while he was trying to pilot the ship. He sighed as he felt her fear subside. 'Good girl, now I need you to stay on the bridge and keep an eye on that computer. If Diana and John turn it on, I need to know. Can you tell me if they do that? If you're too scared, it's alright, but it would help.'

Bolstered by the knowledge that her parents already knew about the bomb, Elizabeth relaxed and agreed to keep watching it. She liked the idea of being able to help. There wasn't anything she could do to stop the fighting between the Visitors and Humans, but this she could do. Besides, if she was watching the bomb computer, then when Daddy and Mommy came to turn it off she would be right where they could find her.

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Ham Tyler climbed out of his truck and looked in amazement at the field where his squad was launching their assault. Somehow the scroungers in charge of getting the hot air balloons and pilots for the same had managed to get twenty of them. Tyler hadn't thought that they would get nearly that many, although he had enough red dust bacteria to give them all at least one payload. He threw a grin over his shoulder at Chris and yelled, "Alright let's get to work!"

The next several hours were filled with getting the balloons ready. Tyler helped to spread out the balloons themselves, helped to check rigging, over saw test firings and generally just made sure that everyone had everything they needed to launch. Tyler had been involved with the hot air crowd for years now. There was nothing more peaceful he had found than floating through the air in the basket of a hot air balloon. It was a great way to relax and in his line of work not having a way to relax was just asking to burn out. 'TheFixer' was too good at his job to let himself burn out.

Tyler went back to his truck and redid the calculations to divide the bags of red dust as evenly as possible among the balloons. "Ok," he said and turned to the men who would pass out the red dust. "Each bag of dust weighs 25 pounds. Eight of the balloons gets four bags, the rest get two each. Figure out which ones can take the extra weight. Remind each pilot that we drop the dust at nine a.m. on the dot. If they reach drop height before then, they need to hold that altitude until drop time."

FINAL BATTLE FINAL BATTLE FINAL BATTLE FINAL BATTLE FINAL BATTLE

The worst part about Robin's first real raid, and hopefully the last, was the waiting. She stood alone next to the hatch of the cargo shuttle her husband was flying, while around her the other resistance and fifth column members were standing together in small groups. Robin could practically feel their anticipation. Martin was flying the transport, not because he was the best pilot, but because he was the one most likely to be able to bluff his way into the mother ship if there were any problems. There were perks to having years of experience with a particular bureaucracy.

It was so silent in the transport that even as far back as she was Robin was able to hear Martin talking with the Visitor's version of air traffic control. Robin glanced at where Harmony stood holding onto her medical kit. Robin could tell that she really wanted to cling to Willie who stood next to her, but she was doing a good job of standing on her own. It was Harmony and Willie's first raid too, but at least Willie knew how to hold the laser rifle that he had been given, even if he looked like he was about to puke from sheer nerves.

Robin couldn't hear what Martin was told, but she could hear the transport settle down to the mother ship's deck and power down its engines. They'd made it on board. She checked her own medical kit and her laser pistol. She'd been learning and practicing for six months for what would happen in the next few hours. She would not fail now. Elizabeth was depending on her. She nodded to Mike, Julie and Martin as they walked over to the hatch.

The four of them plus Elias would be the ones headed to the bridge in an attempt to stop Diana and John from arming the bomb. The rest of the raid team would be putting the red dust into the ship's ventilation system. Mike left the transport with Maggie, carrying nothing more than a folder with blank paper in it. They had worked on this part of the plan for hours as it was the one bottle neck of the raid. If they could not kill the controller and lock out the bridge from the controls before anyone knew anything was wrong, the entire raid was over. They'd be dead before they could get any of the landing bay doors open. Robin prayed that no one noticed the reverberator wrapped around Mike or Maggie's necks.

As Mike went to the controller's booth, Maggie worked her way into position. Dressed as one of the security contingent, she could put herself in a position to head off anyone in the landing bay before they had a chance to react to the fighting. When they heard a Visitor cry out and laser fire begin; the resistance members charged out of the transport. The sound of gun fire soon joined the sounds of the Visitors laser weapons as the Resistance members and Visitor security guards tried to annihilate each other. Fortunately for the Resistance members they outnumbered the security guards more than two to one.

The bridge attack group moved through the firefight and out one of the doors leading further into the ship. Martin had made certain that they all knew the path they needed to take, and if necessary, (at least in Robin's case) walk it blindfolded. When the firefight in the landing bay stopped, Martin took charge. He pointed out the vent they needed to unload the dust into to Caleb, and directed the rest in moving the bodies of the security guards into hiding. If anyone wandered in, the last thing he wanted was for them to find a battlefield where a nice, safe landing bay should be.

FINAL BATTLE FINAL BATTLE FINAL BATTLE FINAL BATTLE

Ham Tyler and Chris Faber were sitting not far from the front of the Visitor Embassy, with a grenade launcher sitting between them. "See if you can put one right on their front porch," Tyler told his friend.

"Not a problem," Chris said, the laughter in his voice threatening to burst out at any moment. He dropped a plastic bag full of red dust into the launcher. It had a small charge in it, which detonated the minute it hit the ground. One of the guards screamed in pain, and it started a chain reaction of panic. The fact that the guards closest to the explosions, that continued to rain down on the embassy, were falling down screaming and clawing at their throats did not encourage anyone to remain calm.

Tyler noticed that Mike's mother was being herded into the embassy. He didn't like those people who supported the Visitors, and he knew that Mike didn't either, but he really couldn't let Mike's mother be killed if he could stop it. He continued to calmly order new placements for the small bombs as the Resistance members began charging towards the embassy. He wasn't in charge of this group; in fact other than backing Chris up with the launcher he wasn't really involved much at all. He knew though that Robert Maxwell was good at planning these small raids. The man was really motivated to kick the lizards off of Earth.

The Visitors started firing back and Tyler added his own shots to those of the resistance members charging in, only to stop when Robert called halt to the forward charge. Donovan's mother was running out of the upper floor of the embassy, onto the balcony only to be shot by Steven in the back. That was all needed. They continued the charge into the building and Tyler was very happy to encounter Steven himself as he made his way inside. Steven wasn't any good at all at fighting hand to hand and Tyler easily took him down. Rather than giving him the easy way out with a bullet or a laser shot, 'The Fixer' pulled one of the small bags of red dust that he had left out of his pocket and poured the entire thing over the lizard's face before walking off. He relished the sound of Steven trying to yell as he suffocated on the red dust clogging up his lungs.


End file.
